


Starting Over

by drellassassin



Series: Redemption and Rebirth [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Coping, F/M, Implied Relationship, M/M, Post-Destroy Ending, Post-Mass Effect 3, So many implied relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-22
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-09 15:06:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 32,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1147430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drellassassin/pseuds/drellassassin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When faced with tragedy, everyone finds a way to cope, both in good and bad ways. Immediately after the battle in London, Kaidan Alenko realizes that he has to find a way to manage without Commander Jennifer Shepard. If he does it successfully or not, well that's up for debate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Day 1

**Author's Note:**

> Typical disclaimer goes here on not owning anything Mass Effect or Bioware related (though wouldn't that be nice?) 
> 
> A prequel to [Finding Shepard](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1036723/chapters/2067511).

_"Here, take him..."_

_"Shepard.."_

_"You gotta get out of here!"_

_"Yeah, that's _not_ gonna happen."_

_"Don't argue with me Kaidan."_

_"Don't leave me behind..."_

_"No matter what happens, know that I love you. Always"_

_"I love you, too. Be careful.."_

He remembers watching her run for the beam as the Normandy started to take off, the doors staying open as long as they could before they had to break out of there. Kaidan found himself at the cockpit, standing over Joker's shoulder. He stood there, battered and bruised, weak and bleeding, watching with a pained look at the battle below.

He remembers Liara coming up behind him, "Kaidan, we have to go. We have to get out of here."

He remembers pushing Liara's hand off his shoulder, feeling helpless, feeling terrible that they were leaving the battle, right when Shepard needed them most. Right when Shepard needed _him_ the most. “We can’t just _leave_ , there has to be something we can do!”

He remembers his cries went unheard, as they broke the atmosphere and got to the nearest mass relay, as out the window the Crucible warmed up to fire. It was a brilliant red, unlike something he had ever seen before, and that was what made it worse. Shepard couldn’t have survived that.

He remembers the ship bucking for balance against the wave of energy shooting towards them, taking out the reapers and it could take them out as well. They hit the mass relay just in time and shot off, but not before their ship was hit with a piece of the energy.

He remembers falling to the ground, wincing in pain, struggling to hold onto anything in the cockpit that he could, as EDI fell lifeless from the co-pilot’s chair. Joker’s pained voice calling out for her didn’t help matters, and he was losing control of the ship.

He remembers the impact of the ship on to the planet below, the ship grinding into the ground with a sound that even a Varren couldn’t love. The ship grinded deep into the ground, and finally stopped, though not without losing power in the process. Kaidan was wounded, but it wasn’t anything worse than what he got on the battle field.

He remembers struggling to get up, Liara running over to the cockpit. Joker had slumped out of his chair and crawled towards EDI’s lifeless body on the ground, completely powered down, begging her to wake up. Joker ignored Liara’s questioning if he was okay, and continued to beg for EDI to wake up. She didn’t.

He remembers taking Liara’s hand, standing up on shaky legs, as Liara used her omni tool to figure out where they were. Uncharted planet, she said, but the air was breathable. Kaidan tried to push off of Liara to go and see for himself, but his legs wouldn’t keep him up. So together, they walked to the door, where James and Cortez were prying open the door.

He remembers the sound of the door finally opening, both James and Cortez needing to pound the door open as best as they could. What greeted them behind the door was a strange garden planet, beautiful, but deserted. Kaidan walked out, Liara’s arm around his waist to help him, James watching Kaidan’s other side, as they stepped out to warm sun shining down on them.

Then, he remembers collapsing to the ground, screaming out in pain, because things weren’t right. They were stranded. They were alive, but they were alone. Kaidan was alone.

He remembers this as the first action he took without Commander Jennifer Shepard by his side.

****

**************

After Kaidan and the others stepped out into the seemingly fresh air, he had fallen to the ground, screaming out. Liara immediately tried to help, but Cortez held her back. “Don’t, Liara. I...know what he’s feeling.”

All Kaidan knew was that he was aware of what he was feeling -- too aware of what he was feeling. They survived the war. They crashed. They left Shepard in London to save the day, and to die. Alone.

It didn’t feel right. Kaidan was an Alliance soldier, and he knew he would have to die for his cause. His cause was Shepard’s cause. His life was Shepard’s life. His love was Shepard’s love. He would have gladly given his life to save hers, or to die by her side saving the galaxy, and instead he was forced to retreat.

_"You gotta get out of here!"_

_"Yeah, that's _not_ gonna happen."_

Kaidan’s hand formed into a fist and slammed into the ground below him, hitting something hard underneath where he had fallen onto his knees. He retracted his hand, now freshly cut from the rock surface, ignoring the shooting pain. He took a deep, shaky breath as he pushed off his hands and rocked back on his knees before he stood up, grabbing James’ hand as a way to balance and let go just as quickly once he stood.

Chatter happened around him as he stayed silent. “Where the hell are we?” James asked, looking around, shielding his eyes from the sun shining down on them.

“I don’t know. I can’t get any readings. We’re...alive though.” Liara said, struggling with her omni tool but eventually gave up.

“The ship is busted up, and we don’t know where we are. We need to get back to Earth.” James replied, his voice anxious.

“We will,” Cortez sighed, as he looked around, and looked at the ship. Then, he brought his attention to Kaidan. “Major, are you okay?”

“Uh,” Kaidan started, blinking himself out of the daze he had allowed himself to fall into, anything to ignore the physical pain shooting through him, and the emotional pain that he felt closing around his heart. It was hard to breathe. His arm might have been broken. He had a lot of deep wounds. The love of his life might have just died. “I’m okay,” he lied.

The four of them stood outside for a little longer before Liara started to talk about finding out where they were, how their supplies were, and she went back inside. James and Cortez hung around a bit before Cortez suggested they go back and see what the damage was to the shuttle bay and engineering. James started to protest that he wasn’t an engineer, but Cortez insisted they’d need someone for the heavy lifting, and James finally agreed.

Kaidan was left alone outside, but he couldn’t wander far. He limped slightly back to the edge of the ship, and ended up falling against it with a soft thud, and the ship creaked slightly in effort against his sudden movement. He had never been this physically close to the outside of the Normandy before. He had never seen a ship destroyed like this before.

Struggling to balance himself out, struggling to breathe, he closed his eyes.

_"Don't argue with me Kaidan."_

_"Don't leave me behind..."_

Foot steps came staggering behind him, and the sound shook Kaidan out of his thoughts, fighting back the hot sting of tears. He wiped at his eyes with his left hand, unable to move his right arm. Broken, it was definitely broken.

The approaching footsteps stopped beside him, and for a brief moment there was a silence. “Garden planet?” Joker asked weakly, as Kaidan turned to look at him. Joker’s face said it all, and Kaidan knew his face mirrored his.

“Yeah.” Kaidan replied and nodded towards Joker.

“EDI’s dead.” Joker’s voice was soft, cracking at the last word, emotion fighting to come through but the pilot wouldn’t let it.

“I’m sorry.” Kaidan said, sincerely, clearing his throat.

“I bet the Commander made it. She had to, she’s superhuman.”

“Yeah, I bet she did.” But just because they both were saying it, didn’t mean either one of them believed it.

They stood outside for a few more minutes before they went back inside to see what could be done. Joker headed back to the cockpit, Kaidan went to see if Chakwas was okay, and could reset his arm.

They would have to take it one step at a time. Anything more than that, and they were all bound to fall apart.

Kaidan was barely keeping it together as is.

_"No matter what happens, know that I love you._

_”...Always"_


	2. Day 25

Day 25  
“Can you try it again?”

“It didn’t work the first time, and you’re going to fucking electrocute me again!”

“Maybe you deserved it. Just try it again.”

“ _Fine_. I suddenly start acting like I’m Frankenstein, and you’re gonna get it.”

“So you’ll finally admit you _are_ a monster, Joker? I’m shocked.”

“No, _I’m_ about to be shocked once I turn this power back on.”

“Just do it already! Stop complaining.”

Kaidan’s right arm was in a cast and sling, standing near the switch for the main electrical grid, with Joker underneath the main panel, wires hanging around him. Everyone had found their own jobs around the ship, and they were doing their best to get things fixed -- with the amount of people on the Normandy, they were able to get a lot of things done. It had been twenty five days since they crash landed on the garden planet (Joker wanted to call it Venus, Liara groaned in annoyance, so they just called it ‘The Garden Planet’ for now) and they needed to be useful. They needed to get back to Earth, and there was only one way to do that.

They gradually got news of what happened on Earth, once the extranet was set back up. Liara was the only one with access at the moment but she kept everyone abreast to what was going on - reconstruction efforts started. They were still looking for wounded and MIA soldiers.

Commander Shepard was still listed as MIA.

“Alright, here we go.” Joker muttered, hesitant at first, as he clicked the two wires together, and a spark jumped between them. “ _Jesus_!” He yelped, backing up a bit from the dashboard, but slowly, everything started to jump back to life. The electrical grid shot to life, and all systems started to become operational, though at a slow pace.

“See, Joker? You’re useful.” Kaidan laughed, and Joker groaned.

“I’m only useful because you broke your fucking arm.”

“Hey, you did too…”

“Only because I slept funny last night, _fuck off_.”

The two men grinned at each other though, proud of their achievement. There wasn’t much to be proud of these days. There wasn’t much to laugh about these days. But they were alive, everyone on the ship was, and despite the crash landing, they were all in good spirits. They were all even in good health, Chakwas made sure of that the best that she could.

Still, things didn’t feel whole, and the longer they stayed on the planet, the more certain Kaidan was that he was losing what he was trying to still fight for.

He needed to go back to Earth and find Jennifer. He had to. It was all he had left to fight for.

“Hello? Calling Major Alenko, snap out of it!” Fingers snapped in front of his face, and Kaidan blinked, staring back at Joker. “We still got more shit to do, come on. I want to get off this planet already.”

“Uh, yeah okay, I’ll be there in a moment. I need to check in with Chakwas for a bit.” Kaidan muttered, and Joker raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah. Okay.” He nodded, understanding, and headed off towards the shuttle bay dock to see what he could do there.

Kaidan left engineering, and headed for the maintenance ladder, the main way the crew had been going up and down the floors thanks to the elevator being out. Even though they finally restored full power, Kaidan didn’t want to take any chances. Not yet.

Despite the broken arm, he was able to climb up the ladder carefully, and continued on to level three, where there was someone waiting to use the ladder. “Hey Doctor.” Kaidan muttered as he shifted off the ladder for a moment, to let her use it.

“Hello Kaidan. Going where I think you’re going?” Chakwas offered a small smile, though she couldn’t hide the sadness in her features.

Kaidan shrugged, “Yeah, I’ll come by later...I could use another pain shot.”

“Be careful on exerting yourself, we don’t have many shots left. Between you and Jeff, the shots are almost gone.”

“Where are you heading today?” Kaidan asked, as Chakwas got on the ladder.

“Heading out to the CIC, going to head out for some more food. Or whatever I can find.”

“Are we running low?”

“No, but I don’t want to take the risk.” Chakwas moved to get on the ladder to climb up, “I’ll call down when I’m off the ladder.”

Kaidan just nodded in thanks and watched as Chakwas disappeared up the maintenance ladder and a few moments later he heard her call down to let him know it was all clear. Kaidan got back on the ladder and climbed up, past the CIC and to as far as the ladder would take him.

It wasn’t without some struggle that he was able to get off the ladder on the top level, but he had done this enough in the past twenty five days that it wasn’t as difficult as it was the first time he tried this.

Setting his feet on solid ground, he headed towards the door to the Captain’s quarters in front of him, the door pushed open with some effort from Vega (since Kaidan couldn’t do it himself). So far, only Kaidan would come up here, and people respected that. Joker understood most out of anyone - he had fought to keep EDI’s body around, but Kaidan and Samantha convinced Joker that a funeral for her would be better. EDI would have wanted that, they kept saying, but Joker wouldn’t listen.

He gave in eventually, and they found a place to bury EDI, and Joker rested some flowers over the fresh grave. But just because they did that, didn’t mean he had closure. He was still trying to think of a way to bring EDI back - she had still been a part of the ship, after all.

But when Kaidan told Joker each day he was going off on his own, Joker never really asked Kaidan where he was going because he knew. They all knew. Kaidan heard some muttering amongst the crew, _he’s just torturing himself going up there all the time_ , but he didn’t care. It might have been torturing himself a bit, but it was all of Shepard that Kaidan had right now and goddammit he was going to hold onto it.

He walked into the cabin, carefully stepping over things that had fallen. He had spent a lot of time up here cleaning it out, trying to make it look the way that it did before - he couldn’t do much else with his arm broken, and while it healed, he needed to do _something_. He couldn’t just sit by and wait for things to be fixed.

Hell, he had to be fixed in some way, right? He felt broken, and if being up here in Shepard’s cabin made things better for him, well he was going to hold onto that as long as he could.

Shepard’s fish had all died when the ship lost power, with nothing to take care of them, they died off quickly. The space hamster, well no one knew where that was, but rumors were that it survived somehow (it survived a collector attack, chances are it survived a crash) and it was running around the ship. Her model ships were all still there, though tossed off their shelves. Kaidan was taking the time to put them back one by one - soon there wouldn’t be any left to fix.

He wanted to have as many excuses to keep coming up here as much as he could.   
On the desk rested a photograph of Shepard and Kaidan, taken on the Citadel. They had managed to find a place that wasn’t completely destroyed by Cerberus, and while Kaidan had set up his omni tool to take a photo of them, Shepard had stolen a kiss. His surprised look registered perfectly -- happy and surprised, both of them able to find beauty even in small destruction.

Not that the destruction of the Citadel was small, but it made people realize they had to protect what they had and those they loved. They had to live in the moment. No one knew that better than Jennifer and Kaidan.

Looking at the photograph though, caused a painful ache in his chest that he couldn’t wish away, and okay maybe being here was torture. He kept telling himself that this was all he had left, but he wasn’t even sure he could believe that any longer.

“Alenko!” The intercom came to life, Joker’s voice booming through, “We got the intercom working, I bet you’re excited. Also, get down here, Samantha says she might have an idea on how to get us up back in the air and off this damn planet.”

The intercom fizzled out, and Kaidan swallowed hard, not realizing he had been holding in his breath. With the power working, it was a matter of time for things to get working again. They had hope of heading home. Shepard had always said that with all of them working together, they could accomplish anything.

Still, it felt weird to accomplish things without her around. He just had to tell himself that he was doing it _for_ her instead. To head home. To try to find her, to get any sort of word on her at all.

Taking a deep breath, he turned around and walked out of the cabin, and started back down the maintenance ladder, still not fully trusting the idea of the elevator yet. That would come later.

One step at a time.


	3. Day 50

Home was still rubble of shattered buildings, but it was home. It was still jarring to come back to Earth, finally making it off the planet they had crash landed on, taking almost a month to get home. Not that there was much to come home to. Still, the moment the Normandy managed to land, people started to cheer. It was like the prodigal son was coming home.

Only, the person that saved the day wasn't with them, and was still missing. How they hadn't found anything of Commander Shepard was worrisome to Kaidan, and it was something that hadn't left his mind since they got back ten days ago.

Ten days and everything still felt so different now. Earth was no longer home to just Humans, but Asari, Turian, Quarian, Krogan...everyone was still here, helping to rebuild the Citadel in between trying to rebuild their ships to get them home to their own planets. The Normandy crew had split up into their factions, getting back to their people and seeing what they could do to help - it made sense. Tali went to speak with her people, Garrus went to help his. Liara immediately tried her best to get the top Asari engineers that were on the ground to help with the Citadel. Things were progressing before they got home, but they moved even faster once they landed.

Kaidan was surprised at how quickly repairs were able to be made. The Citadel was going to be back in its rightful place in the sky soon enough, as soon as they managed to get into the station and clear out everything that was in there. Bodies, blood, any reminder of the war. People didn't need to see what had happened on the Citadel to be reminded of the war they all survived. Kaidan didn't even want to go into the Citadel to see what was there, but they would do it anyway. They had to.

So it was on Day 50, Post Commander Shepard, Post Reaper War, that Kaidan, Cortez, Vega, and Garrus suited up along with a group of others headed into the station to start the cleanup.

Kaidan's arm wasn't completely healed, but it was healed enough for him to help out, and even if it wasn't he would have done it anyway. It was important to help out, to see what could be done to fix things, to try to get live as it was back to normal. If life couldn't go back to how it was before the war, though with some of the lessons they learned _because_ of the war, then what was the point of surviving?

Still, even that positive outlook couldn't prepare Kaidan and the crew for what they saw once they got into the Citadel. With power recently restored, the bodies of those who lived on the citadel were all around, the keepers finally paused, dead on the ground. Blood was everywhere, and against the walls were the remains of an electric shock wave that shot through the station - the activation of the crucible. Kaidan placed his hand on the wall, not surprised that there was still a little heat left to the walls.

"Major, what's wrong?" Cortez asked, appearing next to Kaidan, who then took his hand off the wall.

"I was just..."

"...would you look at this? Jesus, you have to be kidding me here!" Vega called out, and Kaidan and Cortez looked over in that direction, Vega looking to be bent over a pile of bodies. "What was the need for all of this?"

"I don't know. I don't want to know." Garrus muttered, as he trekked on ahead, his gun still out in front of him in case anything still moved.

The men moved in silence through the Citadel, picking up important things as they found them - mementos, dog tags, anything that might identify the lost - and held onto them tightly as they kept walking forward. Every now and then, someone would talk about what they were seeing, and the others would chime in, but the conversation never lasted long.

Kaidan was thankful for that.

The more they walked into the Citadel, the more they realized that this clean up was going to take a lot more time than expected. It was going to take a lot of people to do it, but Kaidan assumed people would be willing to help out. The repairs on the station had gone well, it only made sense that they would be willing to finish the job.

Soon though, Kaidan and the others came across a part of the Citadel they had not been at before. Long hallways lead down to a room that was lit slightly, and Kaidan was the first to realize what the room was. "This was..."

"...where the arms opened up." Vega finished, " _Shit_."

The four of them stood in silence as they stared out to the still wide open arms of the Citadel, though they had been repaired significantly since it's last use. There was no sign of Shepard, but as they walked further in, something caught Kaidan's eye.

A set of dog tags, the light hitting them in just the right way to get someone's attention, next to a pile of dust.

"When the Crucible went off, how powerful do you think that was?" Kaidan said, as he bent down to pick up the dog tags. He looked up towards Garrus, who shrugged.

"With what I saw of the blueprints? It was powerful. It did take out the Reapers, I don't know how anyone would have survived that blast." Garrus spoke, as he joined Kaidan, bending down and running his omni tool over the ash on the ground.

The omni tool beeped, but Kaidan didn't need to know what the omni tool said to know what it was.

In his hand were the dog tags of Admiral David Anderson. Kaidan cleared his throat, standing up, the dog tags tight in his hand. "We have confirmation on Anderson," he said, his voice quiet. The mood in the room was somber, rightfully so, and they took in the room, scanning for anything valuable before they finally left.

Once they did, Cortez cleared his throat, "We need to make sure no one else sees this part of the Citadel. We need to close it off, make it into a standing memorial, anything but we can't let people..."

Vega's hand fell on Cortez' shoulder, "Don't worry, Esteban. We'll all make sure it's cleared out and locked up."

Kaidan raised an eyebrow towards the conversation between Vega and Cortez, and shared a look with Garrus before the four of them headed back down to the docking area where they had come in. They started to make a list of what needed to be done, what needed to be cleaned, how many crews were needed to take on the task of getting things back to normal.

They all agreed on one thing though: no one but their crew was going to handle the rooms they were just in. It was the last place Anderson had been, and possibly Shepard too.

The fact that Shepard might have dissolved into nothing like Anderson had, all due to the fact that the Crucible was powerful enough to destroy everything it hit, made Kaidan sick.

He was starting to lose hope that he would ever see Shepard again the way he remembered her. Vibrant. Strong. Personable.

_Alive_.

That night, after everything was sorted out and the appointed leaders from all of the groups agreed to assign out people to the project, and everyone decided on what needed to be done, the crew went back onto the Normandy for sleep.

Except for the four men who were on the station that day were unable to sleep. Instead, they sat around in the mess hall, talking about what they saw, what it did to them. The fear that Shepard didn't really make it out alive. That maybe they wouldn't be able to get back to normal, would anyone really get back to normal?

"We're going to have to try," Kaidan finally said, "Because if we don't go on with our lives, then Shepard died in vain."

With that, he stood up and walked out of the room, and walked off of the Normandy and back on to land. If he couldn't sleep, he'd need a distraction, and helping out was the best he could do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to the wonderful [masterthief](http://archiveofourown.org/users/masterthief/pseuds/masterthief) who betas me and remains my partner-in-crime.


	4. Day 100

When Samantha Traynor figured out that Kaidan had started to keep a tally of the days, of how long it had been since the war, she wasn’t surprised. Actually, Kaidan was the one who was shocked that she didn’t react how he had expected. He expected her to tell him to just give up the ghost and focus on what was important, he expected her to keep his head held high and dp what was best for everyone else. When he realized he had expected her to react as Shepard would have reacted, he felt embarrassed.

When he told Samantha this, she laughed, but not the type of laugh that was making fun of him. It was a small laugh, one that showed she felt bad that he still wasn’t dealing with this well, and simply suggested that he do whatever he could to make things right for _him_. It wasn’t expected. But it was nice to hear something different than what he thought she would say.

One hundred days since the war ended, since Shepard disappeared, since everything changed. The Citadel was almost back to full power now, and the only people staying on the station were those that were working to fix it.

So this meant that there were soldiers to move the heavy stuff, engineers to get things functioning, mechanics to make sure the engineers didn't mess anything up, and anything else people could come up with. Despite all the people though, thousands were still back on Earth, waiting to come back up to Space, up to the Citadel which was now almost permanently in Alliance space.

It would make sense that those who were not used to Earth's atmospheres be put up on the station first: Turians, Quarians, Krogans...the Salarians seemed to be dealing with things well enough and surprisingly were ok with everyone else heading to the station before them. They continued to work on getting their crash ships up and working again, and that seemed to be everyone's goal. Get ships up and working again. Head out of Alliance space, head back home.

For a lot of people though, they weren't sure where home was anymore.

Kaidan was one of those people.

Sure, physically Earth was his home. And physically, he was living on the Citadel, serving as a pseudo police force with other Spectres that were still around under orders from the Council. But just because he was physically somewhere, it didn't mean that he was mentally home.

One hundred days was a long time to still mourn for someone and not move on. It was a long time to hold onto something that seemed very unlikely to return. Though, people around him seemed to understand. It was...

...pathetic. It was pathetic, he was pathetic, why couldn't he just move on?

There was always some sort of self loathing that came up in the day to day, and today was no different. He spent his days overseeing rebuilding efforts, his arm fully healed now, his heart lesser so. He spent his nights struggling with sleep, reliving his past mistakes and things he should have said to Shepard night and night again. So sometimes during the day, when he had a break, he'd essentially zone out.

"Hey!" Samantha's voice broke through, and Kaidan turned around to see Samantha and James standing in front of him. "We..have a surprise. Well, sort of. Right?"

James shrugged, "Come on, Elvis," the bigger man joked, using the now ever familiar nickname and Kaidan couldn't quite get the hang of.

"Where are we going?" Kaidan asked, raising an eyebrow as he fell into step with Samantha, James taking far longer strides than them, walking in front of them with a determined stride. "And what's with him?"

"Lots of things. You know, changes." Samantha shrugged, her tone oddly cheerful. It was almost enough to bring a smile to Kaidan's face.

Actually, it was. Dammit, she was good at that. Samantha noticed the smile and nudged Kaidan's shoulder, "Come on, it's around the corner."

He knew well enough to know where they were going - the lights may not have been all the way on, but the structures were repaired enough that he knew he was on the strip. The casino's lights weren't all the way on yet, and the arcade was completely dark - only simple lighting lead the way towards the apartment building.

His heart was in his stomach - could he handle this? Could he deal with going back to that apartment? Both of the previous owners were no longer with them - one had been essentially evaporated with the Crucible, and one was still missing. Presumed dead. Most likely dead. What was going back here going to solve?

Samantha seemed to notice that Kaidan's walk wasn't as fast anymore, it wasn't matching with hers, but she didn't stop to turn around to see what was wrong. There was a reason that she was doing this with James -- no one else was ready to see what this apartment could do to Kaidan's stability, and they were the only ones who seemed strong enough mentally to help him through it.

She reached the doors just as James did, and the two of them waited for Kaidan to finally come up in protest, "What are we doing here? Is this really necessary?", before they opened the door.

When they did, Kaidan couldn't prepare himself for the flood of memories that would come back to him. If memories were a physical being, it would have knocked Kaidan off his feet and to the floor. He took a deep breath as he walked into the apartment. James hovered by the door, leaning against the wall, as Samantha took point to walk around with Kaidan.

The apartment was in surprisingly good shape -- to be honest, most of the things on the strip were now, not much to clean up. The strip was far enough away from the edge of the Citadel's outreaching arm that the power of the weapon didn't take much out , and what it _did_ take out, it would be easy to repair.

Kaidan folded his arms in front of his chest as he stood in the middle of the living room, looking around. Most everything seemed to be in order. Somethings were missing, at least this is what Samantha seemed to be saying, but Kaidan wasn't actually listening. He broke off from her to explore the apartment, pick up things that had fallen, making notes to himself of what needed to still be fixed and what needed to be cleaned. What could stay, what needed to be thrown away.

It wasn't until he had reached up stairs, and into the larger bedroom that Samantha said, "We were thinking that it was only right for you to have it. We didn't want...someone else to have this place, to take it away from all of us, and I...well I honestly thought this could help you get some peace."

Samantha was leaning against the door frame as she spoke, and Kaidan found himself helplessly standing in the middle of the bedroom, not sure where to go. The furniture was ruined and would need to be replaced. There were broken light bulbs, and some wiring still hung from the ceiling. That would need to be fixed.

"Thank you, Sam, I just don't...think it's right. To be here alone, I mean. I..." Kaidan's eyes fell to the floor, "I'm not dealing well with being alone, you know? I don't know."

He sighed heavily, and looked up at Samantha, "So while...I agree that we need to keep this with one of us, I don't know if I'm your person."

"I thought you might say that!" Samantha said, and pushed off the wall, "Which is why I'm going to be your roommate." She grinned, "I can help you get this place back into top shape, we can redecorate and replace what we need to, keep what holds value to us, things that remind us of Shepard, and we can make this a place of good memories and happy past rather than focus on...the negative."

Kaidan had to admit, Samantha had a way with words, and she certainly knew how to get to him. Granted, those words weren't exactly poetic, and really he was easy to manipulate these days when it came to Shepard, but she was a friend. He trusted her, and his trust never came easily.

"If I agree to this..." He started, but Samantha interrupted him.

"Just agree and we can talk logistics later, it's not like we can move in here yet anyway, we have a lot we have to fix to make it safe. But just agree."

"I..."

"Hey, Elvis, just agree with the lady, eh? Save the arguing for things that matter." James called out from downstairs, and Samantha laughed.

"Alright. Alright!" Kaidan sighed, exasperated. "I agree."

"Good! Okay, I...shoot I need to get back to my shift at the wards, but I think Steve might come over, maybe Tali and Garrus? Okay we will talk later!" Samantha grinned, and patted Kaidan on the shoulder, "This is going to be good for you, I promise, okay?"

"Yeah, okay, go! Go. Don't be late for your shift." Kaidan waved her off, following her down the stairs, finding James leaning against a different wall, but in the same stance. Samantha left the apartment quickly, leaving just James and Kaidan.

"Come on, man, I'm starving. Let's get some food." James patted Kaidan on the back, which caused Kaidan to jump a little at the force of the contact. "Maybe they have some beer..."

"Pretty sure that's a no, James," Kaidan shrugged, "But food would be good."

It was weird to think that a small gesture such as giving Kaidan the apartment would put him in a better mindset, but it did. Despite what he was telling himself over the past one hundred days, he wasn't alone. HE didn't have to go through any of this alone. Maybe once he realized that fully, he could open himself into moving on, starting over with his life.

Everything would take time to fix, and it was still a few weeks before they could allow everyone to return to the Citadel and formulate some sort of life, but it was something. Everyone else seemed eager to start up their lives again, and maybe Kaidan could feel that too.

Though right now, all he could feel was relieved. Feeling something was good, no matter what it was. He'd take it.


	5. Day 160

Sometimes, when people asked him how long it had been, Kaidan would lie and say that he wasn't keeping track. The reality was, he had been keeping track, though it was no longer down to the exact minute because he needed to start weaning himself off the past eventually. But just because it wasn't down to the exact minute didn't mean that he didn't know it had been one hundred and sixty days since the war ended.

That fact was actually slapping him in the face more than it would, especially today.

The first order of business, once the Citadel was back up and running enough that everyone could move back in, was that they wanted to honor the fallen. Admiral Hackett had specifically asked Kaidan to help out with planning the memorials for both Anderson and Shepard, because out of all of those who were left, Kaidan was the only one other than Hackett who knew them best.

Kaidan felt there was something fundamentally wrong with this statement. Sure, he knew Anderson well. He had recommended Kaidan for his promotion to Major, he had been the rock Kaidan needed, keeping himself grounded as everything else around him was going to shit. But as far as he knew, Anderson had been like that for everyone. Hackett asking Kaidan to help out was an honor that Kaidan couldn't refuse even if he wanted to. He wanted to. He really wanted to say no.

He didn't, of course, and after some nudging from Joker (who protested that he knew Shepard and Anderson well too), Steve, and James, Kaidan agreed.

Anderson's memorial was a week ago, and a plaque was put up in his honor, and a statute would soon be put up in the Presidium once they could all convince themselves that Anderson wouldn't be snapping at them to use the metal in the statute for something more useful. Like tools, fixing ships, fixing the Mass Relays.

The statue would take a while.

The memorial was a nice one, and Hackett gave a good speech and told some stories that even Kaidan was shocked to hear. It had lightened the mood, it had made people laugh. Laughing was good, any emotion other than sadness was good, but as Kahlee Sanders told them all during her tribute, Anderson wouldn't want them to cry. He'd want them to celebrate that we won the war, and we get to see the next day.

It wouldn't be until a quiet moment later, when Kahlee spoke quietly with Hackett, Kaidan, and the rest of the Normandy crew that was still around, that she'd admit that her biggest regret was not being able to see him before he died. "I will never forgive myself for that, even though I know he would be so upset to know that. I never got to say goodbye, I never got to tell him that..."

Her voice had trailed off then, though Kaidan knew what the words would be. At least he got to say goodbye how he wanted to, though he never wanted to say goodbye to begin with.

So it had been a week since Anderson's memorial, and now it was time for Shepard's.

Understandably, Kaidan wasn't handling it well.

"Where _is_ he?" Jack asked, pacing the downstairs of the apartment, walking back and forth in front of the door. It was clear she didn't want to say goodbye either, but Jack was never good with emotions that she didn't want. Which were all of them. All of the Normandy's crew (or most of them at least) were waiting downstairs in the apartment, each dealing with the tension of going to the memorial in their own way.

Jack was pacing. Liara was trying to calm Jack down. Steve and James stood by the door, Samantha sat on the couch, Joker was in the other room leaning on the bar. Garrus and Tali were by the windows.

Kaidan was upstairs.

Possibly throwing up.

"Jack, he'll be fine, we should head down to the Embassy," Liara started softly, placing her hand on Jack's shoulder, who immediately shoved it away.

"Don't touch me, _shadow broker_ ," Jack growled the name as if it were an insult, and Liara just shrugged, seemingly trying to give up.

"Hey, why don't we just go down, meet him there?" Steve suggested, pushing off the wall where he was leaning next to James, and shared a look with the younger marine.

James nodded, "Esteban is right, Kaidan knows where to find us. He knows we wouldn't do this without him." He opened the door and gestured for everyone to file out, but Joker, Tali, and Garrus stayed behind.

"Should I go see what..." Tali started, wringing her hands together nervously, and Garrus placed a hand on her shoulder.

"We have to give him time."

Joker seemed to have enough of this, and shoved off the bar the best that he could, "That is the worst possible thing you could have said, Garrus." Joker had changed a lot since losing EDI, letting himself go, no longer shaving, but he was alive. He had told a few people that he still had his life, and that because of that he felt guilty. "Time is the worst thing to have when you lose someone." Joker shook his head, and adjusted his baseball hat. It didn't matter that it didn't go well with the formal attire.

"I'll head upstairs to get him, you guys go ahead. We still got an hour, right?" Joker looked at Garrus, who looked at Tali and then nodded. "Then go, I'll talk to the Major. Or Spectre. Or whatever."

Sighing deeply, Joker headed up the stairs to the bedroom, where he found Kaidan dressed in black (as they all were), his head in his hands, sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Kaidan," Joker started, but Kaidan interrupted him.

"I can't fucking do this, Jeff."

"You can, and you will, because you're not the only one who lost her, Kaidan." Joker's voice was harsh, but Kaidan knew what he was doing.

There was only one other person who fully understood what it was like to lose someone you loved due to the end of the war. What a pair they made.

Kaidan cleared his throat and dropped his hands to his knees. He raised his eyes to meet Joker's, Kaidan's eyes a puffy red from crying, though he wouldn't admit it.

Truth be told, he wouldn't have needed to admit to it.

"Come on, let's get this over with," Joker said and Kaidan's eyes narrowed. Joker flinched slightly.

"Get this over with?" Kaidan stood up, annoyed, "This is the final goodbye. This is all that we have left. Why..."

"...just because she's getting a plaque and shit named after her doesn't mean it's the final goodbye!" Joker retorted, his tone just as annoyed.

Kaidan sighed, "You can't give me false --"

"-- I'm not falsifying anything. I'm not saying what you need to hear. You know Shepard would be pissed if you gave up hope. So don't piss her off." Joker crossed his arms over his chest, "So fucking grow a pair of balls, and let's go."

Kaidan blinked a few times in response, unable to come up with the right words to counter what Joker said, and the tone in Joker's voice said it all.

So Kaidan got up, brushed off his outfit and headed down the stairs and out of the apartment with Joker.

They arrived at the human embassy within ten minutes, and just as they stepped in, the memorial got underway. This memorial would be a private one, a more public one for everyone on the Citadel would be later, once they decided to announce the rename of Huerta Memorial Hospital to Anderson-Shepard Memorial Hospital. Right now, it was for those who needed closure. To honor Shepard, as she would have honored them.

There were some faces that Kaidan knew, and some that he recognized in passing: a drell was present that Kaidan remembered from the memorial that Shepard had held in the apartment. Samara, who Kaidan had run into before, acknowledged him with a nod before bringing her attention back to Hackett, who was speaking. Standing next to her was Zaeed.

Those who were at the apartment before were on the left side, and joining them was Commander Bailey and Aria T'Loak, who looked completely uncomfortable being there. If Kaidan had been fully aware, he might have been suspicious of T'Loak, but since Shepard helped her take back Omega, it made sense. He just didn't think T'Loak was the sentimental type.

On the right side of the room, joining Kolyat, Samara, and Zaeed, were Kasumi and Allers. Kasumi was dressed in her normal attire, Allers seemed to be able to tone down her usual in your face clothing to something that covered her up at bit more. Behind them were Jacob Taylor and Miranda Lawson. Jacob looked uncomfortable, Miranda might have looked miserable but Kaidan couldn't tell. She held no true reaction on her face.

Behind them were Eve, Wrex, and Grunt. It was unusual to see Krogan so quiet and stunned, but Wrex had always been different than the others, and Kaidan was thankful that he knew the nice ones. Wrex looked over to Kaidan and nodded, and Eve gave a slight wave. Grunt stayed looking forward.

It seemed that everyone that Jennifer Shepard had ever helped was here. Kaidan stayed in the back of the room, watching silently. What would Shepard had thought of all of this? She had always been the type to make sure those around her felt safe, but would she had felt safe in this situation? Everyone she knew and loved were here, crying over her, telling stories about her, wishing she was alive.

Kaidan wasn't crying now, he wasn't telling stories about her. He held out the hope that she was alive, but with it being close to two hundred days since the war, he was starting to give up on hope. He just wanted peace. He wanted...well he wasn't really sure what he wanted.

He had been lost in his thoughts, but when he realized everyone had turned to look at him, that Hackett had addressed him. "Major, would you like to say a few words?"

Kaidan swallowed hard. He nodded and headed to the front of the room, and stood behind the podium. There was a photograph of Shepard to his left, and he looked at it for a moment. "You know, Shepard...would have found all of this ridiculous."

There were some murmuring amongst the people present, and Kaidan continued, "She'd want to know what the fuss was about, because she was only one person. She'd tell us that we would have all done the same thing if we were in her position. She'd laugh, and tell us all that we were just taking things too far, and to stop feeling sorry for ourselves."

Kaidan cleared his throat, "Then, after everyone had left, she'd break down. Because that was the person that she was. Strong in front of the world, but broken when alone. We all are. But through Shepard we knew...we knew that we could _be_ strong if we allowed ourselves. That we _can_ have moments of guilt, and of grief, because it's..." Kaidan looked up at the crowd, "normal to do so."

"I'm not good at speeches, those were always Shepard's strong points. She knew how to rally the troops, she knew how to get us all to stand behind her. We are still standing behind her. We exist, we _live_ because she helped us to live. We survived, because she helped us to survive."

Kaidan paused, the silence in the room almost deafening, and his eyes fell to his hands gripping the podium in front of him. "I loved, because she helped me to love." His voice was quiet and shaky, and when he raised his eyes, he glanced over to Miranda, who immediately looked away.

"The best way for us to honor Shepard is to live our lives. Live, love, laugh, win, lose, all of those." Kaidan shrugged, "Because if we don't, then what was all of this for? What did we fight for? What did _Shepard_ fight and...die for?" He paused.

"So, this is how I choose to honor Shepard; I will live my life. I will remember her every day, and thank her every day for giving me the chance to see tomorrow. I will keep moving forward, because that is what she would have wanted."

He had never been good at speeches, and when he didn't know how to end it, he simply just walked away from the podium and went back to the back of the room. He avoided eye contact with everyone, and Hackett came back up to ask if anyone else wanted to say something.

No one did.

The memorial concluded, and an even smaller reception followed in Hackett's office located at the Embassy. It was there that they told the more personal stories - Hackett talked about the first time he met Shepard, Garrus told a funny story about when she found him on Omega, Tali told everyone how Shepard learned every word to Tali's favorite song from Fleet and Flotilla and belted it out on the top of her lungs just to make Tali laugh. Everyone had their own stories, but Kaidan found he was stuck remembering his own.

The moments he remembered now were the more intimate ones, how their friendship turned into one far more trusting than it was before, and then grew into something even deeper. He remembered the first time they fought because they were scared of losing each other, and the fight ended with them both blurting out they were in love at the same time. He remembered the fight on Horizon, and the pain he felt for months after. The good and the bad, he wanted to remember it all.

"Major," a voice broke him out of his thoughts, and Kaidan looked up to see Miranda standing in front of him. She looked nervous. "I wanted to thank you."

"For what?" Kaidan raised his eyebrow towards the woman, trying his best to ignore the conflicting emotions that Miranda stirred in him. She brought Shepard back to life, but got Shepard to work with Cerberus. Both sides of the coin were very strange.

"For sharing that speech with us. It was very moving, and honest."

"Well, Jennifer would have wanted it that way." Kaidan sighed, "We all knew her, we all can learn from her."

Miranda nodded, a small smile on her lips appeared and faded quickly. "Agreed."

The silence between them got worse, and Miranda finally excused herself, holding out her hand to shake with Kaidan's. They shook hands and Miranda disappeared out of the office alone.

Kaidan didn't have much time to think about how odd the exchange was, as immediately Wrex, Joker, Garrus, and James came over. "Elvis, we're thinking of heading to the bar after, you in?"

"Come on, Kaidan, if anyone needs a drink now, it's you." Garrus' mandibles flared in a laugh, and Wrex then nudged Kaidan's arm.

Though the nudge felt more like a punch, so Kaidan winced slightly.

"Old times, right?" Kaidan said, shrugging, and James laughed.

"New times, Elvis. Let's get you living again."

Five hours later, Kaidan stumbled back to the apartment drunk and alone, but feeling a little better knowing people were around to help him get through things. They were all around to help each other.

But the alcohol definitely helped a lot more than Kaidan thought it would.

So when he went up to bed, a bottle of Peruvian whiskey went with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you to my partner-in-crime, masterthief, for the beta!


	6. Day 195

When they had the memorial weeks ago, Kaidan had promised himself that was going to do his best to try to move on, to get on with his life. To essentially give up the ghost that had been following him around for half a year. But it was always easier to say something but not follow through, and that was exactly where Kaidan found himself now.

It wasn’t as if he wasn't trying to move on. It wasn't as if he didn't have his good days. He did. He had been having a lot of them lately, spending time in the casino with James and Joker, getting out his frustration in the rebuilt arena with Jack and Garrus, even trying to go on a date or two.

IN fact, he had gone on more than two dates. It seemed like everyone wanted a piece of the second human spectre now, and while James encouraged Kaidan to enjoy it, he didn't want to. It felt strange, to try to get back on that particular horse when he wasn't ready to in the first place. _New experiences, Elvis,_ James had said, and Kaidan had to at least try.

First there was a blond woman, though Kaidan didn't catch her name. She reacted like a fangirl, and was more interested in Kaidan's interactions with his roommate Samantha instead of being interested in him. That night ended bad for Kaidan, but was good for Samantha. Kaidan couldn't help but laugh at that.

Next there was an asari spectre named Nasra. Nasra and Kaidan hit it off pretty well actually, were able to tell war stories and then some, but by the end of the night, they realized they were more like friends who needed a sounding board than a potential couple. Kaidan found he was thankful for that -- it gave him someone else to hang out with other than the Normandy crew, and Nasra suggested his next date. She had mentioned that she thought this woman was Kaidan's type, but she couldn't be sure.

There had been too many weird meetings and rejected fan letters by this point, but Kaidan felt almost desperate to find a connection with someone new, someone he could reach out to. So he agreed to the blind date, and Nasra set something up and told Kaidan to meet his date at Ryuusei.

He cringed a bit, going back to the sushi place without Shepard would be strange, but maybe the floor wouldn't be made out of a fish tank this time. Then again...he hadn't been the one to fall through it.

Now, Kaidan was preparing for his blind date. At Ryuusei. A place that reminded him way too much of Shepard. The last shore leave, the party, it was a painful reminder that everything had changed.

A quick glance at his timer told him it had been one hundred and ninety five days since the war ended. Shouldn't he be more comfortable around old memories by now?

As Kaidan walked downstairs in the apartment, he heard whistling coming from the couch, and he looked over to see Samantha, James, and Steve sitting in the living room watching a vid. "Looking good, Major!" Samantha laughed, "Do you have a date?"

"Yeah, haven't you heard? Elvis got himself set up by that cute Asari, though I don't know why he didn't want to spend more time with a blue goddes--" James started, laughing, but was punched in the arm by Steve before he could finished, "Dammit, Esteban, that hurt! Where'd you learn to punch like that?"

"I learned from watching _you_ , Mister Vega." Steve smirked, and Kaidan could have sworn he saw a blush tint on James' cheeks for a split moment.

Kaidan walked over to the small group and looked down at his attire, "Too much? I don't...well you know I don't really do this dating thing...well..you know?" His face showed how nervous he was, and he bit his lower lip as a way to deal with it.

Samantha stood up and walked over to Kaidan, and put a hand on his shoulder, "You'll be fine! You look dashing, and I'm sure whomever your date is, will love meeting you!" She grinned brightly, doing her best to cheer Kaidan up. He sighed softly, and shrugged.

"I should go, I'm going to be late..." He shrugged off, and waved off James who started yelling about how he should let them know if he needs the apartment to himself that night. James' yelling stopped when Steve punched him again -- or so Kaidan assumed, all he heard was _hey_ and Steve laughing.

*******************

When he arrived at Ryuusei, he had been waved to the front of the line, and the door man grinned towards him. "Ah, Spectre Alenko! Your table is ready, there is a young woman already waiting for you." He man winked and Kaidan rolled his eyes as he walked into the restaurant.

He thought that finding his table would be difficult, but with the way that people were stopping to stare and look at him, maybe it was going to be a lot harder than he thought. He just wanted to give up and go back home, have a few beers, and head to bed. Was this really worth it?

But his eyes fell on a familiar shade of red hair, sitting on the shoulders of a woman sitting up straight in the chair, her back to Kaidan. Her hair was half pulled up, the rest falling around her shoulders, and the black dress she wore seemed to fit her snuggly. He approached carefully, as he asked for her by the name Nasra gave him, "Leanna?"

The woman turned around and grinned at Kaidan, and his heart went into his stomach. Were his eyes playing tricks on him? "You must be Kaidan! Nasra has told me _so much_ about you! I'm really glad you showed up! Heck, I am too, you're quite a handsome man." Leanna held out her hand and it took Kaidan a moment to realize what was happening before he took it and shook. He nodded, and moved to the seat across from her, trying to look anywhere but at her.

She looked almost exactly like Shepard. Nasra wasn't kidding when she said she thought Kaidan would like her.

“So, Kaidan,” Leanna grinned, leaning forward towards him, and Kaidan felt her leg brush up against his underneath the table, “Tell me about yourself. I’ll admit, _I’m interested_.”

Despite his better judgement, Kaidan found himself grinning.

*******************

This didn't exactly go how Kaidan had expected. He had expected dinner, maybe an interesting conversation or two, a few drinks and then they'd go their separate ways. As much as his friends wanted him to move on, Kaidan was hesitant. Yet, he had agreed to let Nasra set him up on a blind date with someone who looked almost exactly like Shepard, from her eyes to her lips, even to the way the dress curved around her body.

And also to the way the dress fell off said curves later that night.

They had ended up at Leanna's apartment in the wards, a smaller apartment than the one Kaidan called home now, but it was nice enough. But truth be told, he hadn't been focusing on the apartment.

"Come here," Leanna had purred, and Kaidan, after having more than enough to drink, was willing to do whatever she asked. They shedded their clothing, and Kaidan wasn't sober enough to think that Leanna _wasn't_ Jennifer Shepard.

In his mind, this was Shepard in front of him, asking him to come to her, to kiss her hard against the wall, to carry her to bed and make love to her.

By the time he was sober though, and their clothes were all over the place, Leanna was sleeping in the bed next to him, naked. He was sitting at the edge of the bed, a look of utter disappointment in his face. That wasn't Shepard. Had he used Leanna because she looked like the woman he so desperately wanted?

He remembered once hearing from his friends in the academy that a one night stand could be the best thing or the worst thing you could do, depending on your reasons for doing it. The guilt he felt was telling him that this was a bad thing. It was a bad thing to sleep with Leanna, to pretend that she was someone else that he could never get back.

Kaidan took a deep breath before looking over his shoulder at the sleeping woman next to him, and he pulled the blanket over her body as he stood up from the bed. The walk of shame was never one that Kaidan liked to do, but he pulled his clothing on, fixed his hair, and left Leanna's apartment as quickly as he could. He knew Nasra would hear about this from Leanna, but Kaidan didn't care. He couldn't do that again.

He couldn't use Leanna because she looked so strikingly similar to the woman he loved and lost. He couldn't put himself through dating again, because honestly he still wasn't ready. Even the connection of human contact, of trying to fulfill that urge and desire, wasn't fulfilling. Nothing about tonight had felt right, and for once Kaidan told himself he wasn't going to dwell on it.

He called a car and headed to the nearest store, picking up beer before heading home.

*******************

The apartment door slid open and Kaidan was immediately hit with loud laughter coming from the living room. "...so then she sent a virus that was nothing but naked Krogan photos, and trust me, you do _not_ want to see that!" That was Joker's voice Kaidan heard, and as he walked further into the apartment, he heard Garrus laughing as well.

"I have seen that and it's...I don't wish that on my worst enemy." Garrus' raspy voice came out, laughter tinted to it.

"So are you saying that Turians look better naked?" Samantha asked, just as Kaidan walked into the living room, and Kaidan held out his free hand.

"How about we don't try to go any further on that? No offense, I don't want to see _anyone_ naked." The room erupted into laughter, as Kaidan fell onto the couch next to James and Steve, and noticed that everyone was surrounded by empty bottles of alcohol. He pulled out a beer from the case he picked up and opened it.

"How was your date?" James asked, nudging Kaidan with his shoulder, though it almost pushed Kaidan completely off the couch.

Kaidan paused, trying to think of what to say. Finally he shrugged, "It was okay."

"Just okay? What, she wasn't pretty or anything?"

"Maybe he's not into Sushi, Vega," Steve chimed in, and Kaidan shook his head, as James looked shocked.

"Why wouldn't you be into sushi! What is so wrong with it?"

"Maybe he wasn't into _her_ sushi," Joker chimed in, and Kaidan almost spit out his beer.

"Hey! The sushi, the _actual_ sushi was fine, thank you very much." Kaidan laughed, "But she was just okay. We had..." His mind flickered back to the hour before, her moaning as they moved together... "dinner and that was it. There was nothing there." He shrugged it off, and took a drink from his beer.

He was thankful that the conversation didn't linger on him long -- they had gotten used to the fact that Kaidan never came back with successful date stories, so this could just be chalked up as just another bad date.

And it was just that. A bad date that had a bad...okay, it wasn't a bad date, it was actually pretty good. He just couldn't remember anything about Leanna other than the fact that she looked a lot like Shepard, and wanted to know everything she could about him. He never thought he was that interesting of a person, so he didn't really have much to say.

He never mentioned Shepard, not once.

He did end up calling out her name though later that night.

It was another reason why he had felt guilty.

He kept to himself while everyone around him told more stories, laughed at what was on the television, and drank whatever they could find. Eventually people started to go their separate ways, and Kaidan retreated to bed before the last few people left.

Tomorrow would be better, and tomorrow he would put this all behind him. He'd focus on himself instead. Maybe that was the best way to move on, was to find out who he was now.

Yeah, he'd do that.


	7. Day 237

_This match brought to you by Eldfell Ashland Energy. We power. We provide._

The final buzzer rang out in the arena, and people cheered from above, as the announcer declared there was a winner to this month's big competition at Armax Arsenal Arena. The competition was simple: thirty people enter, pair up into pairs. As a pair is eliminated, the field narrows down to fifteen. When there were only fifteen people, everyone fought all enemies solo. So it wasn't a surprise when the last four people standing were people from the Normandy's crew. These were all people that had fought every type of enemy out there, and besides, it brought more people into the arena to watch the fight.

More people in the arena meant more sales would be made, donations could be taken, more bets would be made (because even bets on the arena weren't illegal anymore -- anything that would bring money into the Citadel and continue the rebuilding efforts was good for business). Soon, crowds had split into four factions, each cheering for their person of choice.

But when the buzzer sounded, the highest score and fastest time went to Kaidan Alenko.

When he walked out of the arena's main floor and into the dressing rooms, he immediately was smacked hard in the shoulder by a grinning Jack. "Knew you could do it, boy scout. Look at you! Our little boy is all grown up." She laughed and proceeded to punch him in the shoulder, and to his own credit, he didn't wince.

Maybe it was the adrenaline that he still had shooting through him, or the fact that his biotics still hadn't completely cooled off, but he was feeling great. When it was just him on that arena floor, fighting reapers with nothing to depend on but himself, it took a weight off his shoulders he didn't know he was feeling. Hell, he had only entered the competition because he lost to James in a poker game - it was either enter the competition with him, or pay for all the drinks the group had for the next month, and the choice was an easy one. He didn't have enough money for everyone, that was certain.

"Elvis, man, bringing the _pain_!" James cheered, approaching Kaidan as he clicked his armor off, the sight of Liara and Jack talking and comparing notes behind James. "See, I knew you had it in you. Just needed a little push."

Kaidan scoffed, "A little push? You tried to bankrupt me!" Scoffing or not, there was laughter there. Kaidan had been doing a lot of that lately.

"Hey, whatever ese, you just beat out the shadow broker, I think that's a big accomplishment! Plus, you know, the credits can't be too bad."

"Major, I still demand a rematch!" Liara chimed in, and Kaidan nodded, as he held out his hand as an agreement, and Liara shook it.

"You're on."

He had clicked out of his armor completely now, down to his basic clothing as he excused himself to change into something a little easier to wear in front of company, and came out in his Spectre hoodie and jeans. His Things were in a big duffle bag that he lugged over his shoulder, and by the time he got back into dressing room, only James was left. The younger man was zipping up his own duffle bag when he turned around to greet Kaidan. "Hey, you ready to go?"

Kaidan nodded, "Yeah, just let me stop at the front desk first --”

“--to collect your winnings?”

“Hah, yeah.” Kaidan shrugged, finally feeling his biotics fully cool down (at least so he didn’t look like he was going to use his biotics on anyone walking by), his heart still beating fast thanks to the fight. It had been a while since he had challenged himself like that, even if it was only computer generated enemies.

It made him realize that he missed the fight sometimes.

As the lieutenant and the spectre walked up the main stairs, they were greeted to cheers, and watched as their names lit up the scoreboard. Kaidan now held the highest score ever in the history of the arena, and James held tightly onto second place, only a few points behind Kaidan. This made James laugh, as he held his duffle bag up on his shoulder, an obvious display of physical strength. “Watch your back, Elvis, that top rank is going to be mine soon!” He shrugged towards the door, where there were some fans waiting to talk to them, and he headed over there as Kaidan walked to the front desk.

It didn’t take long to collect his winnings and have his credits transferred into his account - it was easier considering he was an employee of the council, and he ended up giving half his winnings back to the citadel anyway. There was no point on creating a personal credit empire if the place he lived was doomed to fall from space any moment.

Not that it would. No, they were all assured of that when people started to return. That didn’t mean the thought didn’t cross Kaidan’s mind now and then. He wasn’t always one for rational thoughts lately.

He thanked the woman behind the counter, and as he walked away, he heard her immediately squeal to the woman next to her, “ _I cannot believe I got to talk to him! Oh my god, he’s so hot!_ ”

Uh. Well. That was...new? Shrugging it off, Kaidan headed over to where James and some fans were waiting, and Kaidan seemed to get the tail end of a conversation James was having.

“...yeah, well there are some things that us physical guys can do better than biotics, you know what I mean?” James had turned on full flirtation mode, though he didn’t seem to realize it -- which Kaidan had realized it was par for the course with the larger man.

Distracted for a moment by fans asking for autographs and pictures, Kaidan brought his attention to the people standing in front of him, and he cheerfully did as they requested. He remembered being a young kid looking up to his own heroes, and while he couldn’t possibly be a hero to these people - they had Commander Shepard for that -- he was happy to oblige.

The crowd disappeared slowly, and there weren’t many people waiting around, so Kaidan moved to stand next to James, and wait for their conversation to end.

The two women who James was talking to seemed to be flushing a bright red, and one bit her lower lip, almost looking at James expectantly. They were dressed...well let’s just say the dancers at Afterlife wore more clothing than these two. “So, Lieutenant Vega, what are you doing tonight?” One asked, an Asari with light blue skin, while her female companion, a dark skinned woman with long black hair, looked on happily.

“Tonight?” James’ voice suddenly got nervous, as he looked over to Kaidan on his left, and he shrugged. “Busy. Maybe another time, eh?” He cleared his throat, his tone back to the overly confident one that Kaidan was used to, and he nodded a respectable goodbye to the women, who clearly looked disappointed. Kaidan just looked at James with a raised eyebrow as the younger man looked over, “What? Let’s get going.”

“Are you telling me that you just turned down two beautiful women?” Kaidan asked, completely confused by what he had just seen, as the two of them started to head out of the lobby and down the main stairs.

As they reached the door to walk out, they walked right past Miranda Lawson, who walked in with her head held high, and an almost elitist air about her. James said hello and Kaidan waved, but neither one of them were acknowledged. “Damn, someone’s taking something out on the arena tonight..” James muttered, loud enough so Kaidan could hear as they walked out the front door.

The apartment wasn’t that far of a walk - it would take about fifteen minutes or so, and Kaidan was in no mood to take a cab. “James, you want to tell me why you turned those women down?” Kaidan asked again, more curious now than anything, as the men fell step and step with each other, taking longer paths through the strip to the apartment, simply because they could.

James shrugged, looking from Kaidan to his feet as they walked, “Hey believe it or not, I’m not the type of guy who just jumps into bed with every beautiful woman I see!” He looked back up and laughed, “You know, a man has his standards. Besides, I’m into someone.”

Kaidan nodded, acknowledging what James meant. “Ah, so you got your eye on a lucky lady?”

“I said some _one_ not some _lady_ ,” James immediately shot back, though his voice was quieter towards the end. Kaidan stopped walking, and James stopped a few steps ahead, looking back at Kaidan before his face went white. “What -- oh _no_! No, fuck, Elvis you’re a nice guy but you’re not my type.” That seemed to break the ice, as Kaidan sighed with relief, and shrugged.

“Normally, I might have taken offence to that, but hey, thanks?”

James snorted a laugh. Kaidan just shrugged, but offered a smile.

“So you going to tell me who this lucky _someone_ is?” Kaidan asked, as they started up walking again, though a little slower this time. James looked like he was confused, and wasn’t sure what to say, and Kaidan wasn’t sure he wanted to know what was coming.

If this was going to become a relationship advice thing, well Kaidan was the worst person to ask about it.

“Eh, I’m not...it would jinx it, you know? Pretty sure they don’t see me that way.” James shrugged, and looked over to Kaidan, “But do you...advice?” James seemed flustered over asking the question, to the point where he couldn’t even word it properly, and his cheeks flushed red.

“Do I advice?” Kaidan asked, raising an eyebrow, “Uh, depends, I guess?”

“On?”

“Well, how well do you know the...person...ok is it a guy or a woman? Though judging by how you corrected me, I’m going to guess it’s a guy?”

James didn’t say anything. Kaidan took that as a yes.

“Alright, so honestly, what’s so wrong with just an honest conversation? Just...putting it out there?” Kaidan asked, and he looked to James, who wasn’t looking at him, so Kaidan swiped his hand at James’ arm. “Hey, you wanted advice of some sort, so pay attention! Or something.”

James laughed, rolling his eyes a bit, “Listen, Elvis, I don’t actually have that much game. I’m a lot of talk. But when it comes to talking about the shit that matters...I’m not you, you know? I don’t…”

“Hold up, are you saying you think I have _game_?” Kaidan stopped and actually found himself laughing. Laughing really hard actually, and he ended up dropping his duffle bag to the ground as he sat down at a near by bench. James, because he was either confused or saw how amusing the whole thing was, started to laugh too, and took a seat next to Kaidan. When the laughter subsided, and Kaidan decided that laughing at _himself_ wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, he sighed lightly. “You know how many bad dates I’ve been on since...it’s been a lot. Hell, the last one I went on, actually wasn’t that bad. Until…”

_They moved together, her moans escalating higher as he thrusted into her, feeling his own pleasure building to a climax. He called out a name, “Jennifer”, but that wasn’t the name of the woman he was sleeping with._

Kaidan blinked, and shrugged. James wasn’t taking that as an answer. “Until what?”

Kaidan sighed, knowing he set himself up for that. “Uh, until we ended up having sex and I might have called her Jennifer.”

“ _Damn_!” James recoiled a bit, a fist covering his mouth for a second, a wince on his face, “Damn! I can’t say I’ve ever done _that_...”

Kaidan rolled his eyes and ignored the statement. “But see, you thinking I have game is hilarious.” He shrugged, “I just think...at the end of the day you should be honest with what you want. You know? Just...you know, take yourself into consideration first? I...don’t think this is sounding right and I feel kinda awkward, are we good?”

James laughed, and patted Kaidan’s shoulder, “Yeah, we’re good. Besides, I know what you mean. Just be myself, and don’t call out Shepard’s name in bed. Got it.”

“ _Hey_!”

“What! That’s what you said, Elvis!”

The two men laughed as they gathered their bags again and headed back to the apartment building. It seemed like everyone ended up crashing there now and then, and it had gotten to the point where Kaidan didn’t mind. It kept him focused on the people around him rather than the people who weren’t and it made it easier.

In a way, maybe he needed to really take his own advice to James to heart. Focus on himself. Give himself time to mourn and get over things.

“So I think I have some beers left in the fridge, is the game on tonight?” Kaidan asked as they headed down the hallway towards the apartment, and James nodded.

“Sounds good man, whatever, you’re the arena’s number one stud right now.”

“Are you sure, I wasn’t the one with the scantily clad women all…”

“Shut. Up.” James laughed.

They reached the door and Kaidan unlocked it, though he was greeted to a dark apartment. The apartment was never dark. In fact, Samantha always left the lights on, they had gotten into an argument about it two weeks ago but it went no where.

But when Kaidan turned on the lights in the apartment, he knew why it was dark before.

He also almost jumped out of his skin.

“Surprise!” The room cheered and Kaidan blinked to see all of the Normandy crew, plus some of Kaidan’s friends from C-Sec and the arena were in the apartment, and were standing in the living room where a banner hung reading _Happy Birthday, Kaidan!_

Well. Fuck. Someone remembered.

*******************************

It wasn’t that Kaidan hated to celebrate his birthday, in fact that wasn’t the case at all. He actually _liked_ celebrating it a lot. But he was still keeping track of the days since the war ended, and this meant they were a little under one hundred and thirty days until the anniversary of it. That wasn’t something he wanted to remember.

Besides, it had been a hard year, and while he was alive, he didn’t think it was important to celebrate him when there were more important things to do. Like fix the Citadel completely, work on getting the mass relays back, all of that.

Still, he was greeted by everyone he knew well and there was a lot of beer and cake, and he couldn’t exactly say no to that.

He also couldn’t say no because he was sure he’d completely break Samantha’s heart -- especially once he heard she was the person who helped Liara organize everything.

“So when I realized it was coming up, I knew we had to do something!” Samantha grinned, well past intoxicated at this point, “Do you like it?” She was sitting on the couch next to Kaidan’s fellow spectre Nasra, with Nasra’s arm around her shoulders. They were a new couple, thanks to Kaidan’s accidental work, but Samantha seemed happy and that was all that mattered.

“Yeah, Sam, it’s great! But next time...give a guy a warning? I could have come in with guns!” Kaidan laughed, taking a long drink from his beer. He sat on the couch across from Samantha and Nasra, sitting next to Joker and Jack.

“Yeah, well if you did, that would have been pretty damn funny.” Joker muttered, and took another swig from the bottle of whiskey he was holding onto, and grinned. “Thank god I was already hiding in the kitchen, no possible way there was anything in _there_ that could have hurt me more than a bullet.”

“Fuck! Give it a break. We get it! You’re a fragile little butterfly!” Jack teased, and lightly nudged Joker, “Kaidan couldn’t hurt a goddamned fly, fucking look at him!”

“Hey! I just kicked your ass in the arena!” Kaidan protested, and Jack shrugged it off.

“Yeah, because I _let_ you. Wanna see what happens if I’m really trying?”

“Ladies!” Nasra broke in, trying to hide her drunken giggling, “You’re both pretty, cut the pissing contest.”

“Uh, I think you got some things mixed up there, love…” Samantha giggled and Kaidan stood up.

“Well that’s _my_ cue, and fuck you Nasra,” He said, though he grinned wickedly at her when he said it. She in return just winked at him and patted his arm as he walked by. It was nice that she didn’t completely blame him for what had happened months before with the blind date, and it was even better that she didn’t tease him for it.

“Well, Sam, at least I know your name…” Kaidan heard Nasra say, and he groaned as he continued to walk out down the stairs. So much for not teasing him.

As Kaidan headed towards the staircase, there was movement out of the corner of his eye. Curious, he went to investigate. What he found was James and Steve sitting on one of the couches close together in quiet, and what looked like, flirtatious conversation. When he was noticed, Kaidan smiled, “I’m getting another beer, do you guys need anything?”

While James just stared at Kaidan with a look of a deer stuck in headlights, Steve just smiled and shook his head, “No, I think we’re good. Right, Mister Vega?”

James took a minute to register, but somehow got out a “Right”. Kaidan just laughed, shaking his head in amusement and walked out. Maybe he had done one thing right, but he still didn’t see himself as someone to give relationship advice. Hopefully _that_ was a one time thing.

So he headed for the stairs, the sounds of the party swirling around him, and mixing in with the already swirling sensation of a little too much to drink. For once, it felt like a good thing.

It was getting towards the end of the night, and people had come and gone -- those who were mostly left now were those of the Normandy crew (minus Nasra, of course), and Kaidan found the rest of them downstairs scattered throughout the apartment. Diana Allers had been there for a while, but she left once she realized that Grunt didn’t really want her there, and Jacob followed out soon enough - he had a kid and now wife waiting for him. Zaeed had mentioned something about wanting to shoot something, and Wrex left with him, because a party with no fighting wasn’t a good party at all (though he did make sure to try to drink everything he could before he left).

When Kaidan got down the stairs completely, he saw Liara and Miranda talking over by the piano, both women with drinks in their hands. He approached them to join their conversation, though their conversation seemed to stop as soon as they saw him heading over to them.

“Lovely party, Kaidan,” Miranda said, politely smiling towards him and he smiled back at her, though something seemed a bit off. “I’m glad I was able to come.”

“Well it’s nice to see you, you seemed a little angry when I walked by you at the Arena.” Kaidan shrugged, and confusion crossed Miranda’s face while curiosity crossed Liara’s.

“Ah, that. Don’t worry, I had some things I needed to take care of.” Miranda replied, rather terse in her tone, and she finished what was left of her drink. “Speaking of, I need to get going,” she said, as she shared a look with Liara, who nodded.

“It was good to see you, Miranda. Let me know if you need any help with your project?” Liara asked, and Kaidan couldn’t help but think that if he was a little more sober, he’d be able to figure out what exactly was going on here.

“Of course.” Miranda nodded, and smiled towards Liara before she brought her attention to Kaidan, “Happy birthday, Kaidan. I brought you a bottle of whiskey, but I think Joker might have already gotten to it.”

Kaidan shrugged, “It’s the thought that counts.”

“Indeed. Have a nice night.” And it seemed as soon as she had come to the party, Miranda finally left it.

Kaidan found himself confused, looking to Liara for answers, and she simply did what she always did, diverted the subject to something else completely. “Kaidan, I have something for you, if you’d like? I think you might want to be in private though.” She brought up her omni tool, and hit a few keys before she put it away. “There’s a message up in the bedroom for you, and something waiting on the bed.”

“Liara…?” Kaidan looked at her, and she started to push him up the stairs.

“Just go! We’ll all still be here, we’ve already decided that those of us who are still here are sleeping here tonight.”

“Oh good, Joker is going to throw up on the couch again.”

“I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen tonight.” Liara laughed, and gestured for him to go upstairs again and he finally just waved her off and obeyed.

*******************************

When he got into the bedroom, there was a package waiting on the bed, and there was a message waiting to be played on the screen. Kaidan let the door slide shut behind him, making sure no one else was in the room before he walked over to the bed.

It was when he did, that he noticed the familiar handwriting. When he looked up at the message, the vid held a very familiar face and his heart lunged out of his chest.

Kaidan sunk to the edge of the bed, the package sliding towards him as he did so, as he brought up his omni tool to start the message.

Jennifer Shepard came to life on the screen.

She looked tired, but happy. Behind her was her space hamster, and all her ship figurines she picked up. The glow of the fishtank brought additional light into the vid, and she was wearing Kaidan’s spectre hoodie.

She always wore his, despite having her own. It smelled better, she said. It was more comfortable, she said. She said all the excuses in the world that she could think of, as long as it meant that he would give his sweatshirt up.

He was wearing that exact sweatshirt now.

Kaidan swallowed hard as he pressed play on the omni tool, and Shepard’s message started.

_Hey Kaidan,_ Shepard grinned, running a hand through her hair, the long red strands hanging over her shoulders. _You’re sleeping right now, and I’d show you what you look like while you’re sleeping, but I don’t want you to turn to stone or anything. Your hair is a bit all over the place. You look like medusa._

Shepard appeared to look behind the camera towards what Kaidan knew as her bed, and her eyes stayed focused on that for a bit before she brought her attention back to the camera. Her smile faded a little bit. _I’m hoping that you don’t have to get this message. I’m hoping that...I can be there with you. But in case that I’m not, I already got Liara to promise she’d give you this. She said she won’t watch it, and I’m holding her to that! Remember..remember that time she claimed she wasn’t listening in on our conversations on the SR 1, but got all flustered when we pretended to have sex really loudly for her benefit?_ Shepard’s features broke into a smile again and she laughed lightly, _Well, she learned her lesson. She won’t watch this. I think she...knows the importance. Or she will. If this needs to be given to you. Which, I hope it doesn’t._

Kaidan cleared his throat as he kept his eyes on the vid, his eyes on Shepard.

_But...okay, listen. It’s...we’re on our way to Earth right now. We’re about six hours out, and I want to wake you up so badly right now, but I want to do this first. I want to make sure you still have something from me, in case...in case things go FUBAR. I’m not sure how tomorrow is going to go, but I know...there is a large chance that I won’t be coming back to you._ On the vid, Shepard tries hard to fight back the tears, but it doesn’t work, and they are falling on her cheeks. Sitting on the bed, Kaidan didn’t bother fighting the tears forming.

_I want you to know that I love you. That...no matter what happens, I have always loved you. We haven’t been without our fights and our disagreements, and I know we have both made mistakes, but we found our way back to each other in the end. That...that’s where it counts. I know that...well, I know that you are the great love of my life. Not one single person will ever compare. No one can ever come close._ Shepard smiled a bit at this, and wipes away some of the tears on her cheeks. _I want you to know that if I’m not around, I’ll still be with you. I will still find a way to watch over you, and love you, and let you know that things are going to be okay. Because you always did that for me. Even now, when I..know we are going into what could be the end, what could be our deaths, I’m not scared. I’m not scared of dying. I’m not scared of the fight. I’m scared of leaving you, and leaving you alone. I’m scared that you’ll forget that I love you, and I’m scared that you’ll…_

There was a long pause in the vid, and for a moment, Kaidan thought the vid had cut out, or was missing the rest of the message. But when Shepard finally moved on the screen, her eyes darting away for a moment, he let out the breath he didn’t know he was holding in. He watched as Shepard shifted in her chair, and ran her hand through her hair again.

_Kaidan, I’ve never been one for having a will. Though I guess that’s a lie, I had one before, and it was carried out, but then I came back so...that was awkward. Kind of hard to get all that stuff back, right? But that’s...not what I meant to talk about. Fuck._ She paused again, and cleared her throat. Kaidan actually smiled at this, because only he had ever seen the Commander unable to find the right words. Only he had been privy to her true emotions, not just the ones she put on for show for the crew.

_This vid is my only will, and I have only one request. Kaidan, if you recieve this video, this means that I am no longer around. But that doesn’t mean I can’t still boss you around, and as your Commander, I have one final request. My request...is that you move on._

Wait. What? Kaidan’s eyebrows went up in surprise, his heart not sure how to react. He knew logically this vid didn’t mean that Shepard was back. It confirmed everything he already knew as true. But…

_I want you to still have a part of me with you, but I also want you to move on. To find love again. I want you to live your life to the fullest. I know you, and I know that you’ll just hold on to me as long as you can. Maybe...maybe this is coming off my conversation with Steve the other day, but I don’t want you to spend your life like Steve did. I want you to live, and love, and laugh, and get angry, and...be you. I want you to...be happy. Kaidan, I love you, and if I’m not around to tell you that every day, I want someone to be able to give you that feeling again. I want--_

Shepard stopped talking suddenly and looked up away from the camera, and waited, before looking back at the camera. _Right now, you’re sleeping in bed, waiting for me to come back to you, and I will. At least one last time, I will come back to you. And I know I said I want you to sleep, but I’m going to wake you up, because I want to remember what you look like, I want to remember how you sound and feel, I want those to be my last memories._

On the vid, Shepard picked up a box and showed it to the camera, and on the bed, Kaidan looked at the box that had slid to his side. It was the same one. _If Liara kept her word, you’ll get this box too. I won’t explain what it is, but you’ll know when you see it. I love you. Now...I’m going to go over to where you are sleeping, and wake you up, so that later...I can fall asleep with you on my mind one last time._

_I love you, Kaidan. I love you._

The vid turned off, and for a long time, Kaidan sat in silence. The sounds from the party below were winding down, but no one seemed to ask where he was. Maybe Liara explained. Or maybe they understood. Kaidan wasn’t sure.

What he _was_ sure of, was that he hadn’t cried this hard in a long time. Not since Shepard had died in the war, and his heart felt like it had gone with her. Well. Perhaps not that dramatic.

He roughly wiped the tears off his cheeks, and looked at the box, taking it into his lap.

Shepard’s familiar writing was on the top of the box, reading _For Kaidan. Only_. He laughed softly at this, mostly because of how rough the underline of ‘only’ looked. Still, he hesitated on taking the top of the box for a few minutes, almost scared to see what was there.

When he opened it, there was a holo frame that still had stayed on, shining a photograph of Kaidan and Jennifer on the SR1. Kaidan’s arm was around Shepard’s shoulders, and both of them were grinning like fools. In the back, both Ashley and Joker were making silly faces, with Ashley giving Kaidan bunny ears.

While he couldn’t understand why Shepard would want to give him this particular image (he already had it), he still liked that she thought to give it to him. But when he reached into the box to pull out the frame, his fingers brushed against something cold and metal behind the frame.

He put the box to the side and turned the frame over, to find a piece of paper and what looked like Shepard’s dog tags. Which, would be impossible, as Shepard was wearing her dog tags when they were on Earth, when she got him on the Normandy and said her final goodbye before she ran for the beam.

“What…” Kaidan muttered, confused, taking the dog tags into his hand. With the frame resting on his lap, Kaidan held the dog tags in the right hand as he opened the folded paper with his left.

_Kaidan -_

_I want you to have these. I don’t want my real ones to end up in the hands of some thief or merc trying to make some credits. I don’t want my real ones to disappear into the rubble. I want them to be with someone I know will take care of them, and hold them close to their heart, just as I did._

_Please hold onto these for me. I know you will._

_Love, Jennifer_

So what Kaidan held in his hand now, were Shepard’s real dog tags. The only thing that could have really identified her under all that rubble. What was she wearing instead?

“She had me create fake ones for her,” Liara said, as the door unlocked and Kaidan looked up at Liara, with a tear stained face. “She wanted you to have them.”

“So you knew about this? You knew that she…” Kaidan wasn’t sure what he was trying to say, but his hand squeezed tightly around the tags.

“She wore replica ones on Earth.”

“Replicas of hers?”

“Replicas of _yours_ ,” Liara said softly, and Kaidan swallowed hard. _Hold them close to their heart, just as I did._

“Fuck,” Kaidan hissed, his voice betraying him. His dog tags looked just like Shepard’s and both held the Spectre and Alliance symbols on each one. If you didn’t look closely at the last name, if you were quickly grabbing someone under the rubble, you wouldn’t think twice.

“Everyone is asleep now, I actually need to head out to my own apartment, I have some things I need to take care of. But I wanted to check on you, make sure you were okay.”

“I don’t know if I’m okay, Liara.” Kaidan answered honestly, suddenly exhausted.

“You will be.” Liara said with a smile, and left the room shortly after.

When Liara left, he watched the door click shut but didn’t bother to fix the door and make sure it was locked so not even the Shadow Broker could get in.

Instead, Kaidan just let himself fall back into the bed, and stared at the ceiling until he finally passed out.

And when he slept, he dreamed of their last night together.

_”Hey”. Kaidan slowly opened his eyes to the ceiling first, to see the windows above giving a fantastic view of the space and stars around them as the ship flew. It wasn’t long before his eyes fell on Shepard, who was curled up next to him._

_“Hey. You weren’t...watching me sleep, were you?”_

_“What if I was?” Shepard grinned, and Kaidan laughed._

_“Well, I...don’t know what I was going to say there, I’m a bit groggy still.”_

_“You told me to wake you.” Shepard said, as she gently pushed Kaidan to his back, and she moved to straddle his legs._

_“I told you to…oh…!” Kaidan realized, and reached up for Shepard, his hands sliding up her legs and up her back, as they met half way. Their lips brushed against each other lightly before their kiss deepened, quickly heading passionate when…_

_“Wait.” Shepard backed up suddenly, and Kaidan pushed himself up, “What’s wrong?”_

_“Nothing, I just...want you to know that I love you.” Shepard said, her fingers lightly running through his hair, “So, I love you.”_

_“I love you too,” He grinned, “Now come here.”_


	8. Day 306

Not that Kaidan was counting anymore, but he knew it had been over three hundred days since he was pretty much forced into a new life. Most people he knew would have started over by now, would have moved on, but he seemed to be (as always) the exception to the case. But nope, he wasn't counting the days anymore, he had totally deleted the application on his omni-tool that let him know the time that had passed down to the seconds. So, if asked, Kaidan wouldn't be able to tell you that it had really been three hundred and six days, 14 hours, 45 minutes, and 6 seconds since everything changed.

Nope, he wouldn't be able to tell you that at all.

He had tried his best in recent weeks to try to take his own advice and just let go, or rather be comfortable with the man he had turned out to be because of everything, but that wasn't working out. Steve stopped by the apartment now and then to check in with Kaidan, but talks usually turned into Steve talking about James, and how the lieutenant had recently moved in with him. "I'm happy for you," Kaidan said one day, a smile that was actually genuine, and it was good to see that Steve had managed to move on past Robert. Steve though, read between the lines and knew what Kaidan was talking about.

"It will get easier, you know." Steve had been drinking a mug of coffee, but set it down on the counter, as Kaidan decided that maybe now was a good time for a beer. It didn't matter what time it was. When Kaidan said nothing but just shrugged in response, Steve continued, "I heard about the messages she left you, what did she say in them?"

Kaidan cleared his throat, stalling for a second before answering, "Uh, well..." He sighed, "She asked me, rather demanded that if something were to happen to her, that I should move on."

"And?"

"And _what_? You asked what she said, that's what she said." Kaidan's tone was defensive, and Steve leaned back in his chair a bit, putting up his hands in a placating manner.

"Okay, don't you think you should take her advice?"

Kaidan drank from the bottle in his hand, his fingers flicking at the wrapper on the glass, his eyes away from Steve as he moved to lean his back against the kitchen's counter. "I have been. I've...honestly Steve, I really have been doing a lot better. Just because I haven't found a new person to be with, doesn't mean I haven't actually moved on."

"Yeah, Elvis has been taking out all his anger out on the arena, it's a sight to see, Esteban!" James' familiar voice called out as the door to the apartment slid closed and James joined the two men already in the kitchen. A familiar and comforting smile was exchanged between Steve and James before James nodded upwards to Kaidan and went to the fridge for a beer.

Yeah, everyone practically lived here with Kaidan now. He had gotten past the point of ever assuming he'd have alone time. Which, frankly, he was alright with.

Kaidan laughed, "See? I'm honestly doing fine. I really am. I appreciate that everyone, and I do mean _everyone_ , has been checking up on me, but I promise you that I am fine. You'd know if I wasn't."

"Are you certain?" Steve asked, leaning forward in his seat, his elbows resting on the kitchen island, his chin resting in his hands, "I've been where you are. I know..."

Kaidan's omni-tool beeped, as Kaidan just held up his hand to Steve, "You'd know. I'm fine." His eyes went to the message that popped up, and his eyes went wide a little bit. "Ah, shit. Sorry, I have to go." He started out of the kitchen to calls from James.

"What's going on? You need backup?"

Kaidan just shrugged, "Spectre business. Since you're both planning on staying here, just...stay out of my bedroom okay?" He teased as he headed up the stairs to get into his armor, and walked back downstairs, and pointed towards the two men in the kitchen, "I'm serious!"

"Alright!" James held up his hands laughing, and Steve was turning bright red. At least someone had something good going for them, Kaidan thought as he headed out the door.

******************

As soon as Kaidan got into his private car, he brought up the vid call and called Bailey. "Bailey, what's going on?"

"We got a situation down on the wards, looks like a double homicide." Bailey's voice sounded tired, and the man didn't look so great either.

Kaidan couldn't help but feel a bit confused though. Ever since things started to rebuild, everyone had tried their best to get along, to the point where there was nothing going on for C-Sec to even do. "Have you identified them?"

"Not yet. Sending you a nav point now, there's something else too."

The omni-tool on Kaidan's wrist beeped with the new nav point and Kaidan programmed it into the car, "I'll be there soon."

"Roger. Bailey out." The message clicked off and the vid disappeared back into the dashboard of the car, as Kaidan made his way towards the crime scene.

******************

"Get that damn reporter out here!" Bailey's voice boomed, and Kaidan locked his car as he headed towards the commotion. There was police holo-tape everywhere, and on the floor there were two bodies covered with a sheet. Another spectre was already there - Nasra, Kaidan's apparently partner now - scanning over the crime scene. As Kaidan approached, the C-Sec officers guarding the scene saluted as Kaidan walked through the holo-tape over to Bailey.

Bailey was pre-occupied, trying to tell one of his people to go get the reporters out of the area. "This does not need to be the gossip on this station, people, _move it_." His commands were met with an "ay ay, Commander" and the two men headed off. Bailey turned around to see Kaidan. "Alenko, good, you're here. Nasra has already gotten started. She can get you up to speed."

"What are we looking at here?" Kaidan furrowed his brow, as he looked at the two covered bodies on the floor of the ward apartment, blood splatter on the wall and some on the ceiling.

"Looks cut and dry to me. Your partner seems to think otherwise." Bailey said, nodding over to Nastra, who stood up from where she was kneeling down and gestured to Kaidan.

Nasra waited for Kaidan to get closer before she started to speak in a hushed tone, "Bailey thinks this is pretty cut and dry, an altercation over supplies, but I don't think that's the case." The Asari Spectre brought up her omni-tool scans, "All their supplies are accounted for. Nothing is out of place, well minus the blood everywhere."

Sighing for a moment, Kaidan crossed his arms over his chest, and looked around the room, his eyes drifting to the splatter on the ceiling. "I don't think a standard altercation over food and drink would end up with this type of a blood trajectory anyway. Have you looked at the victims?"

"No," She shook her head, "I was waiting for you."

Kaidan nodded, and looked over to Bailey, "Can you give us some space to run our investigation? I'll let you know what we find."

"Yeah," Bailey shrugged, "Sure. We gotta keep the press out of here anyway, they're itching for something other than the rebuilding efforts to report on."

Once the C-Sec commander left, and the apartment door shut behind him, it was only Kaidan and Nasra left in the room. Nasra hung behind Kaidan as he bend down and wrapped his fingers around the sheet and pulled it back, revealing a man and a woman. Kaidan frowned, and sighed, shaking his head.

Nasra looked at Kaidan curiously, "What is it?"

"I know these people." Kaidan said, as he looked over his shoulder to Nasra, "The man, his name is Conrad. The woman's name is Jenna. I met them first a few years ago with Shepard." Kaidan sighed again and ran his hand over his now ever present beard and pulled up his omni-tool. "Fuck."

Nasra frowned as well and moved over to Jenna's side, kneeling down next to her, as Kaidan was kneeled down next to Conrad. "Did they have any enemies?"

Kaidan shook his head and looked up at his partner, "Not that I know of. Conrad was..well he considered himself to be Shepard's biggest fan. Went as far to pretend he _was_ her, trying to right wrongs and the like. He could be a bit overbearing, but it was never in a threatening way. Just, a man who looked up to his idol, I guess." Shit, something wasn't right here. Last he heard from Shepard (and damn how that made his heart just clench up a bit involuntarily), Conrad had tried to take a bullet for Shepard, but Jenna had sabotaged the gun that had fired. Shepard had said the two went off together, and she hadn't heard from them since.

"Maybe they have something on them, a clue?" Nasra asked, as she scanned Jenna with her omni-tool, as Kaidan did the same with Conrad.

A ping was heard and Kaidan looked at his omni-tool, and hit a few buttons, "It looks like he had a message recorded." He stood up, as he pulled the sheet back over Conrad and Jenna, and he walked a few steps away as the message played. "It looks like someone called him, but the vid is fuzzy. Bad connection."

"Wait, let me see what I can find there," Nasra said, as she scanned once more, "Bad recording software, it messes up the original message. Here." She pressed a few buttons, "Let's try this."

She directed the vid feed to the near by television, and the message came up on the screen. _"Conrad, it's me. I need your help,"_ The woman said on the feed, but the woman was standing in the dark, only light was catching the bright red of her hair.

Kaidan's eyes went a little wide as the message continued, _"Send me the nav point to your apartment. We need to talk. I've been compromised."_.

"Shit," Kaidan growled under his voice, and Nasra seemed to already be on his wavelength.

"There is no way that is possible, she's not that type of person..."

The vid suddenly stopped, as the rest of the message seemed to self destruct, a virus eating the rest of the message. "Shit, Nasra, can we get it back?"

Nasra scanned and tried her best, but it seemed like the message was lost. "Kaidan," she turned and looked at him, as his clenched his fists together, both glowing a biotic blue, "We have no idea who this person is."

"Looks at bit like your friend, Nasra." Kaidan looked over to her, "Leanna? Who looks a little too much like Shepard?" His anger was now directed towards his friend, and she started her biotics too, as a means to defend herself.

"Kaidan, I had only just met her! You've known me for a year now, I knew her for a month! I have nothing to do with this!"

Kaidan's entire body was now filled with biotic rage, the light dancing off his skin, "Prove it," he hissed at her, even surprising himself with his anger.

"Put me through a lie detector test! Scan my biometrics! You can tell I'm not lying!" Nasra protested, and as a means to keep to her word, cooled off her biotics, "Just, trust me!"

There was a long silence between them before Kaidan relented, and cooled off his biotics, and scanned Nasra. The biometrics showed she was telling the truth, and Kaidan's eyes immediately softened.

"Fuck. I...I shouldn't have reacted like that." Kaidan said, frowning as Nasra put her hand on his shoulder.

"It's okay. I understand. If something were to happen to Sam," She said, her voice trailing off and betraying her a bit, wavering at the idea of something bad happening, and Kaidan just nodded.

"Okay. Okay. We still have to track Leanna down though." Kaidan sighed and ran a hand through his hair, as Nasra crossed her arms over his chest. "But if she knows we're looking for her--"

"--she'll run," Nasra finished, nodding. "I have an idea though. She's been going to the casino a lot, she's trying to see if she can get a job there. We can set up a meeting with her, have the new casino owner act as if she wants to interview her."

"You think that will work? What makes you think the owner will go along with it?" Kaidan asked, eyebrow raised.

Nasra just shrugged, "She owes me. I pulled her out of the rubble at Thessia."

The silence between them spoke volumes, and eventually Kaidan just nodded. "Okay, set it up. Send me the information when you have it, and I'll meet with the owner once you figure out a time."

"Got it." Nasra nodded, as she left the apartment, leaving Kaidan to himself.

Kaidan took a moment to look around the apartment, before heading out. When he did, Bailey was waiting. "Can you make sure these two get a respectable funeral? I'll send you all the information that you have, but I'm officially taking this case over. I will keep you updated though."

Seemingly unhappy to be losing a case, Bailey frowned for a moment before finally nodding. "Got it. Will do."

******************

Kaidan hadn't expected to hear from Nasra for the rest of the day, but much to his surprise, everything was set up and in order. The new owner of the casino, Ne'esia Shapso, was an ex-military commando, who had the business smarts to work her way up into the casino. On top of that, she was reliable, and wasn't shady like the previous owner. Instead, Ne'esia worked with the council and spectres to rid the casino of cheaters and other undesirables and it only helped to keep things running smoothly. Profits from the casino's big events went to the rebuilding efforts of the Citadel, as well as getting supplies to those on Earth, and to those rebuilding the relays. Working with Ne'esia Shapso turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Besides, she apparently owed Nasra. Kaidan had to trust that everything was in order, even if he had an emotional outburst before.

All in all, the plan was simple. Kaidan would pose as Ne'esia's personal assistant, coming in at the end of Leanna's interview to take her into custody. Nasra would introduce Leanna to Ne'esia, because as far as Leanna knew, Nasra was still a good friend. So Kaidan got dressed up, wearing his black suit, and headed out of the apartment to the casino (though not without running past hoots and hollers about going on a date, which he promptly ignored. James had to know better than that by now. Though the comment of _say the right name this time!_ followed by laughter told Kaidan that James hadn't learned at all.)

Kaidan walked through the casino, smiling sweetly at the women who approached him, as he politely declined their invitation for a drink, and headed into the back room, where Ne'esia was waiting. "Ms. Shapso," Kaidan said, holding out his hand, and the Asari grinned as she took his hand.

"Major Alenko, Ms. T'Sori has told me so much about you. It's an honor to meet you." She smiled sweetly as she let go of his hand, "Ms. T'Sori let me know of the plans, and I assure you that I am more than capable of doing my part."

Kaidan nodded, "That's great, Nasra- I mean Ms. T'Sori - said that you'd be helpful and understand. I appreciate the assist here, ma'am."

"Of course." There was a beep on an intercom, and Ne'esia looked at it before looking to Kaidan, "I believe they're here. My assistant's office is right through there, you should have full video feeds and sound." When Kaidan raised his eyebrow at the notion that she tracked all her visitors, she noticed and smiled, "I'm not a fool, I know there are people who wish to sit on the top. I don't plan on letting them."

Kaidan just nodded respectfully as he slipped into the assistant's office, taking seat behind the desk as the actual assistant went to get them coffee. For a moment Kaidan wondered just how many conversations were really recorded and held in this small office, but that would be for another day.

On the vid feed, the door opened and Nasra walked in with Leanna. Leanna had her hair up in a bun, the red in her hair shining brightly, and Kaidan made a fist, trying to hold back his anger. The dress she wore was a replica of one that Shepard had worn to the casino before, and he was starting to feel like this was all a ploy to get under his skin. But if it was, why would she kill Conrad and Jenna? They had nothing to do with him. Why had she said she was compromised?

As Kaidan listened in, Nasra introduced Leanna, and as Ne'esia held out her hand to Leanna, the redhead grinned, "It's Leanna Shepard, but you can just call me Lea, if you'd like."

_Excuse me?_ Kaidan could feel his biotics flicker over his body, and the assistant apparently noticed this as well, as he took a visible step back from the Spectre sitting in front of the feeds. He watched as Nasra tensed up a bit, looking confused at Leanna's sudden admission of her name, while Ne'esia took it all in stride. "Ah, like the great Commander Shepard?"

On the vid, Leanna grinned, "Yes! I legally changed my last name to Shepard as soon as I could, anything to honor the Commander, you know?" She chatted excitedly about how she was always told that she looked like the Commander, and she couldn't get a job as an impersonator unless she really played the part, so why not change her last name? At that moment, Nasra excused herself and disappeared towards the assistant's office.

Kaidan looked up when the door opened and waited for Nasra to completely close the door before he spoke in a hushed, harsh whisper, "Is she _fucking kidding_ right now?"

"I had no idea!" Nasra protested, "She told me her last name was Axeuss! I had no reason to do a damn background check on her! She was a blond when I met her!"

"Was it her idea or yours to set her up on a date with me?"

"Well she had taken a big interest in our friendship once I mentioned I worked with you..."

Kaidan just cursed under his breath as he brought his attention back to the feeds. Ne'esia and Leanna were now talking about the 'job' she was interviewing for.

On the vid, Ne'esia leaned forward on the desk, "Most importantly, I need to make sure that whomever I hire will do whatever it takes to make the role believable. We want only the best impersonators, it is what will bring the big money into the casino, and everyone will pay big money to spend a night with the great Commander Shepard, even if it's not really her."

Leanna laughed, "What makes you think I'm not really her? I can pass as her, I could even change the files in the archives so everyone _believes_ I'm her." When Kaidan heard this, a light bulb clicked, reminding him of the last shore leave he had taken, and fighting the clone. Getting stuck in the archives. This was a huge red flag. "I could even eliminate the competition if I had to."

That was it. Kaidan pushed off the chair and stormed into the room, his pistol trained on Leanna, who turned around in shock, "Is that what you did to Conrad and Jenna?"

"Kaidan! What? What are you talking about!" Leanna stood up, her hands by her side, not taking a defensive stance. Nasra entered the room after Kaidan had, also with her pistol drawn. "Nasra, what are you doing? I thought you...is this a setup?"

"Leanna, we need to take you in, we have to talk to you." Nasra said, her voice calm as she stepped forward, "I'll put my gun away, we can just talk."

Instead, Leanna grabbed the gun she had apparently strapped to her thigh and pulled it on Kaidan. "I had to get rid of them," She said, her tone drastically changing, "When Conrad saw me at the Arena, he thought I was really her. He thought I was Shepard." Leanna grinned wickedly, and Kaidan just scowled at her, his gun trained on her as hers was on him, "It went great for a while, he was doing things for me that I didn't think I could get anyone to do! Bought me all of the clothing that Shepard had ever worn, got me access to her personnel files - no idea that he had it in him! But after my date with you, Kaidan, and when you didn't call me back, I was worried."

Kaidan raised an eyebrow, "Because I didn't call you back, you decided to kill Conrad? How the hell does that fucking work?" He asked, trying his best to keep his anger in check, but he wasn't sure he was doing such a great job.

"If you couldn't fall in love with me, how could I _ever_ be the new Shepard? Conrad was so trusting, but when I went to see him at his apartment, I caught him telling that woman that he _knew_ I was an imposter. I had requested that he get me access to Shepard's Spectre card for the archives but apparently...that's how he knew. Apparently it had been done before."

"Yeah," Kaidan hissed, "By a fucking _clone_. Jesus, Leanna, for someone wanting to be Shepard, you certainly don't know her history very well."

"It doesn't fucking matter! I killed both of them, and there's nothing you can do about it, and now I'm going to kill you too." Leanna cocked the gun, and Ne'esia spoke up.

"Leanna, you don't want to do this. Think of this job, I could make you a star," She started but Leanna turned around, aiming the gun at her.

"Shut up, bitch, like this was ever a real job offer, I see through you." Leanna fired and shot Ne'esia, and Ne'esia fell to the floor. Leanna turned quickly to shoot at Kaidan but instead was met with a bullet of her own, as well as being thrown across the room. Her lifeless body hit the wall and slid down, slumping on the floor.

Breathless, Kaidan looked at Nasra, both of them unable to believe what just happened. Nasra ran to Ne'esia, who groaned that she was okay, it was only her arm. While Nasra applied medigel, Kaidan went over to Leanna and scanned her.

"She's dead," He muttered, mostly to himself, and watched as his omni-tool scanned her biometrics to see if anything else would come up. To see if she was a clone.

"Is she a clone?" Nasra asked, as if reading Kaidan's mind, and he looked over his shoulder to see Nasra helping Ne'esia into a near by chair, letting the older Asari rest as Nasra came to Kaidan's side. He looked away from Nasra and back to his omni-tool, which had finished reading the deceased women below them.

He stood up as he looked over the reports, and shook his head. "Her biometrics match up with a Leanna Axeuss, age 35, born in New York on Earth. Family moved to the Citadel when she was 17. Information here says that she had been in and out of merc gangs and jail, and has an obsessive personality." Kaidan scoffed, "That's the understatement of the year."

"So, she had been telling the truth then, at least when I met her." Nasra said, and Kaidan could tell she was trying to reason with herself, to make herself feel a little better on having to put down someone she had at one point considered a friend. "I should have seen the signs."

Kaidan was silent as he called up Bailey on his omni-tool. He told the C-Sec commander about the incident at the casino, and that they'd need a medic, and that there was one dead. They seemed to have solved the case, but it was going to take days of going through everything to make sure. But from what it looked like, Leanna wasn't a clone. She was just an obsessive fan, worse than Conrad apparently, wanting to take things just a step too far.

When he hung up with Bailey, Kaidan sighed as he looked over to Nasra, "We're going to have a lot of reports to do, but right now, I need a drink."

Nasra nodded, rubbing the back of her neck in an attempt to calm herself back down, "I need to talk to Sam. I just...need to see her, you know?"

Kaidan nodded, "I know."

******************

Three hours after leaving for the casino, Kaidan walked into the apartment with Nasra in tow, and when they got into the apartment, they were greeted by James, Samantha, Steve, and Joker. The moment they noticed Kaidan and Nasra walking in, looking a little worse for the wear, James started yelling about getting into fights, Samantha started worrying, and Steve and Joker simply just looked at each other and shrugged.

"You always get into the good fights! Dammit, Elvis, _come on_ "

"Nasra! Are you ok? You look terrible, well not that you ever really look terrible, but you look...upset? Are you okay?"

The questions and comments from James and Samantha happened at exactly the same time, and Kaidan just held up his hands, "Guys, it's been a _really_ long day, I have no idea what time it is--"

"It's 4am!" Samantha cheerfully chimed in, and Kaidan stared at her.

"Uh, okay, _why_ is everyone up in the living room at 4am? And not at their own apartments?" He lowered his hands, one running through his hair and then dropping, proving how exhausted he was, and surprised at what time it was. He looked at Nasra, who shrugged and made her way over to Samantha, and Kaidan couldn't help but see Nasra put a protective arm around the other woman.

"We hadn't heard from you, we were worried," Samantha said, a blush popping up on her cheeks, and Nasra whispered something in Samantha's ear, which made the blush turn an even deeper red. "But you're all back home and safe now, so, ah, we both _really_ must be going..."

Nasra pulled Samantha with her towards the door, and stopped as she reached Kaidan, "We'll talk this out tomorrow, but we did good tonight. At least, that's what I'm telling myself. Sleep well." She nodded, and Kaidan just nodded in response, waving the two of them off.

As he turned back around, he watched as James and Steve stood up from where they were sitting and were heading for the door as well. "You look like you have a story to tell, Kaidan," Steve said, looking over Kaidan with a worried expression, and Kaidan just shrugged it off.

"It's a story for another time. It's late."

"We'll see you tomorrow," Steve said helpfully, and Kaidan nodded, watching the two men also leave the apartment. Kaidan looked over to Joker, expecting him to leave too, but instead he just looked at Kaidan in response.

"What? I don't have some lover to go back to. Get us some beer." Joker laughed, and Kaidan found he was too, though he wasn't sure as to why he was exactly. He instead headed back to the couch where Joker was, handing him a beer and sat down as well. The two men sat in silence for a bit, watching the Citadel News, when the report of Kaidan's case came on the screen.

Joker leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees, "So that's the shit you got into today? Damn, Kaidan, you have _all_ the fun, Vega's right."

"You don't even know the half of it, believe me." Kaidan sighed, and eventually ended up telling Joker everything, from the first meeting with Leanna, all the way to when both Kaidan and Nasra had to take her down in Ne'esia's office. Joker seemed shocked at the story, and minus a few little comments here and there, he had listened to most of the story.

A silence fell between the two of them, as Kaidan wrapped up, "So luckily, not a clone. Preliminary scans just show she was an obsessive fan, and then we should be getting the confirmation in the morning."

"Wow." Joker muttered, as he finished his beer and leaned back into the couch, taking a moment to think before he looked over at Kaidan, "So, I just have one question."

Sighing, Kaidan looked over to Joker as he finished his own beer. "Yeah? Shoot."

"How many times did you call her the wrong name in bed exactly? Because Vega and I have a bet going..."

All Kaidan did in response was groan in frustration as he allowed himself to fall back into the couch, Joker's laughing practically killing his ear drums.

" _Shut. Up._ "


	9. Day 334

Sometimes, when he got bogged down with a lot of paperwork, Kaidan would wonder if it would ever be possible to give up the Spectre position. The position had been glamorized so much, that he had a different expectation of what the job actually was.

Today had been one of those days where he wished he never took up Udina on his offer.

Of course, the moment didn’t last long, and he knew that deep down he could never really give it all up -- it was the closest thing he still had to being a soldier and not a political game piece to be used by Admiral Hackett whenever he pleased -- it kept him alive. But that didn’t mean he didn’t always enjoy it. Kaidan couldn’t remember if Shepard ever had to file all these reports, but he supposed exceptions were made for her; fighting the reapers somehow had its perks despite all the cons.

While he had promised himself to stop looking at his countdown clock that he had never disabled, he was well aware how close he was to the one year of the war ending. Then again, he didn’t need his clock for that -- it was all over every news station and all over the extranet. _The Anniversary: How We Have All Changed_ was the most read article, and of course was written by one Diana Allers. She had asked Kaidan for an interview for the article. He had respectfully declined.

Just because it was inching closer did not mean he could just give up all his responsibilities though. Kaidan found himself elbow deep in paperwork and reports regarding Leanna and her awkward deception, and the outcome of Conrad and Jenna. They had managed to get a respectable funeral for both Conrad and Jenna, and the outcome was far more than they had prepared for. Surprisingly enough, the two of them had actually helped more people than even Shepard had known about, and Kaidan found he was thankful for that. Despite getting off on the wrong foot with Conrad, Kaidan had always liked him. There was an endearing quality about him that not a lot of people (no matter the race) had these days.

Leanna on the other hand, now that had turned out to be one mystery after another. With help from Nasra, Kaidan had managed to dig more into Leanna’s past. It seemed most of the information in the Citadel database was correct: born on Earth, moved to the Citadel at 18, but what the files didn’t mention was that she had also relocated to a colony off station for a few years too. It seemed she had taken up residence in Tiptree for a while, though luckily she hadn’t made the news there. She just seemed to be like everyone else.

Not that Kaidan could go to Tiptree to confirm all these reports. Not that he could go to any of the Reaper-hit colonies anymore. They never recovered, there was no one left. Not anymore.

But there was one connection that Leanna had that Kaidan found odd. When he reached the name in the paperwork, he leaned back a bit in the chair he was sitting at, looking up over his desk and towards the unused poker table.

He brought up his email on the computer and quickly typed out a message, and sent it off before he went back to his work.

_Joker_ ,

_I was wondering if you could come by, I have something I want to talk to you about. Nothing too big, just some questions._

_-Kaidan_.

A reply came back quickly:

_As long as you’re not trying to seduce me, Mr. Alenko._

Kaidan just rolled his eyes.

************************

“Kaidan?”

“Back here, get a beer if you want one.” Kaidan called back, putting away most of the files that were confidential, but keeping out the ones that he needed. By the time he was done, he looked up to see Joker walking into the room, his SR-2 hat still firmly on his head, though he had finally stopped wearing his Alliance threads. In his hands were two beers.

“So what’s up, Alenko?” Joker asked as he walked over to where Kaidan was, handing him a beer as he sat down on the empty chair near the desk. His attention moved to the poker table behind him, “We need to have another poker night, I still need to kick your ass.”

Kaidan laughed, as he popped off the top of the beer and took a drink from the bottle, “You can try, but you’ll lose.”

“Yeah, yeah. What did you message me for?” Joker raised an eyebrow.

For a moment, Kaidan wondered to himself why he was surprised that Joker was so direct. The moment passed very quickly. “Okay, so remember the case that I’m working on?”

“That stalker one?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, what about it?” Joker’s tone was cautious, as the ex-Pilot looked over Kaidan with suspicion.

“Apparently, it says here she knew your sister.”

“ _What_?” Joker asked, setting his beer on the desk, “This...isn’t very fucking funny, Kaidan.”

Kaidan shook his head, “I’m not trying to...bring back old memories, I’m just trying to figure out all the loose ends. Here,” He held up a datapad and handed it to Joker, “Look this over.”

As Joker looked over the file, Kaidan tried to explain what he had read, “It looks like she lived on Tiptree for a while, and tutored your sister. I also found an old news vid that she was interviewed on, talking about how great it was that she was friends with the sister of a great Alliance pilot.”

Joker cleared his throat, scanning through the files, “I...well, I didn’t know her as Leanna.” He finally said after a few minutes, as he landed on an older photo of Leanna. “She went by Jane. Last name was the same though. I met her a few times when I went home to visit Dad and Gunny.” Shrugging as he handed the datapad back to Kaidan, “Now that I think of it, she did have a lot of questions about Shepard. But that was before Sovereign and Saren went all psychotic on the Citadel.”

Kaidan tapped a finger against the edge of the datapad before he set it aside, “I’m thinking that was when she got her plans. Apparently when she got back to the Citadel, she started to take on merc jobs, or any dirty job she could get that would pay a lot to get surgery to look like Shepard.”

“That’s really fucking awkward, wouldn’t it had just been better if she was a clone instead of a real person _trying_ to be a clone?”

“I think a clone would have been worse. At least for me.”

Joker picked his beer back up from the edge of the desk and took a long drink in reply. There was a silence for a bit, Joker looking at the wrapper on the beer, while Kaidan finished his report - or as much as he could.

“Okay, thanks Joker. I just wanted to make sure there wasn’t...more to this than I was reading.”

“Yeah, sure. No problem, Major.” There was another long pause. “I’ve decided something you know.” Joker finally said, taking another drink from the bottle.

Kaidan raised an eyebrow, leaning back in the chair and rested his beer on his knee. “Which is?”

“I’m going to find her.”

Kaidan’s expression colored with confusion for a moment, and his heart couldn’t help but jump at the thought that Joker was talking about Shepard, but Kaidan knew better. He wore her dog tags around his neck, under his shirt. That was the closest he would ever get to Shepard again. “You mean EDI?”

Joker nodded. “I’m thinking...we still have the Normandy, even if Hackett has decided to use it for his own little victory tours, it’s sitting in dock right now. _We_ still have access to it, and EDI wasn’t always just in that platform.”

“Joker…” Kaidan frowned, shifting on the seat, “Are you sure about this?”

“Why wouldn’t I be? I can get her back, and then we can just find another robot body to put her in, and it will be like I never lost her. She never really liked the old body anyway, she always talked about how top heavy it was...though I told her that _I_ liked it…” Joker rambled on, seemingly excited over his idea, but Kaidan wasn’t sure he could get behind it.

“Joker, I really don’t think this is a good idea. Are you even sure that whatever backups or programs you find will be the EDI you knew?”

Joker’s expression changed drastically, as his eyes narrowed, “Are you telling me that you wouldn’t do anything to get Shepard back?”

“You know that I would, Joker, but this is different.”

“How the _fuck_ is this different?” Joker snapped back, angrily pointing a finger at Kaidan, “Don’t think you’re better than me just because…”

“Just because what?” Kaidan cut off, “If I could get Shepard back I would, but she’s gone! EDI is gone too!”

“ _No she’s not_ ,” Joker hissed, “And I’m going to do this with or without you.”

The men stared at each other, tension between them thick, before Kaidan finally relented. Would he be doing the same thing if he could? Hell, he tried for a while before he was given Shepard’s dog tags and her message. She wanted him to move on, but he couldn’t even do that for her.

“Fine. When do we go?”

Joker knocked back the rest of the beer and tossed it in a nearby bin. “No time like the present. Let’s go.”

“Now?” Kaidan asked, surprised, and was met with an angry glare. “Fine, okay, now.” Joker got up and moved out of the office, and Kaidan was quick to knock back his own beer before following Joker towards the door of the apartment. “If we do this, we’re going to need someone who is good with tech.”

“Already on it,” Joker nodded, and Kaidan could only wonder who he had contacted.

************************

Tali and Garrus were waiting at the door of the Normandy as Kaidan and Joker walked up. Garrus had his arm around Tali’s shoulders, and Tali waved to both men in kind as they walked up.

Kaidan grinned when he saw the two of them, and shook Garrus’ mandible once they got close, and gave Tali a hug. “Tali, Garrus. I didn’t think I’d see you two here. I thought that with the relays almost fixed…”

“That we’d be on Rannoch?” Garrus asked, and looked at Tali as he spoke before he looked back at Kaidan and Joker, “Yeah, we will eventually. I still have things to do here, and…”

“and I want to make sure that I’ve taken care of everything I can here before we leave,” Tali finished, nodding as they all moved to the door of the ship, “I’ve been helping those of our crew who were stuck on Earth, and we’ll all go back to the flee--sorry, to Rannoch, as soon as we are able.” Tali laughed at her little mishap, and Kaidan only smiled at it, as Garrus patted her shoulder.

“Okay, well, I’m glad you guys could make it.” Joker said, “Let’s get this started.” Joker’s tone was more apprehensive than Kaidan had expected, and he followed closely behind as the door slid open.

The helm of the Normandy was always as it had been, and the rest of the CIC looked as if it had never been touched. Or at least, it looked like it had before they crash landed on the garden planet after the war. Kaidan found himself in awe of the ship, and with only the four of them on the Normandy, there was a strange silence that none of them were used to.

“I’m half expecting to hear Traynor over at her console,” Tali noted, “Or hearing Shepard giving commands.”

“I’m half expecting a lot of things,” Joker muttered, as he looked over to the pilot seat, and walked over to it, his hand running along the leather of the seat. “Shit, I really miss this.”

“You’re joining them for the next victory tour, right?” Garrus asked, and Kaidan raised an eyebrow.

“There’s another tour? I didn’t hear about this.”

“Yeah, Hackett told me this morning.” Joker said, turning to Kaidan, “Though he’s using it as morale more than anything else, only a skeleton crew is going, along with me.”

“Ah.” Kaidan muttered, and Tali laughed.

“Kaidan, you sound like a Vorcha.”

“Thanks?” Kaidan laughed, and Joker cleared his throat.

“Can we just get on with this?” There was that nervous tone in Joker’s voice again, and Kaidan just nodded.

Tali gestured for Joker to come with her, “We can go to the AI core, that’s where all her backups were stored. Let’s leave these two here, we’ll just bore them with tech talk.” The two of them headed over to the elevator, and just as they got in, Kaidan swore he could hear Joker say thank you.

As the elevator doors slid closed, Kaidan sighed as he looked around the ship, and looked over to Garrus who was standing at the Galaxy map, though it wasn’t functional right now. “I always wanted to chart a path here,” Garrus was saying as Kaidan walked closer, “I always wondered what it would be like to command my own ship. Then again, I don’t think I could ever be as good as Shepard was.”

Kaidan leaned against where Shepard’s personal computer was, and crossed his arms, looking up at Garrus, “Hey, you were practically her second in command.”

“Even you outranked me, Alenko,” Garrus laughed, and stepped down from the map, “You’d have more authority.”

“On the Normandy?” Kaidan shook his head, “Nah. Shepard never cared for the regs, even when she was back in the Alliance. It would be you over me, any day of the week. And that’s a good call.”

“What makes you say that?”

“You were one of the few who always had her back. I didn’t always.”

Garrus sighed, or at least Kaidan thought he had. Turians were still hard to read for him, but he was able to understand some major body signals at least. “Kaidan, you’re not still feeling guilty over Horizon, are you?”

“No.” There was a beat before Kaidan pushed off the counter he was leaning on, and shoved his hands into his pockets, “Feeling guilty about Earth though.” Kaidan moved to sit on the steps before the Galaxy map, and found Garrus going to sit down next to him moments later.

“There was nothing you or any of us could do, she wanted us on the ship, she wanted us safe.”

“But she didn’t...even think about coming back.”

“People are still looking, we can still find her…” Garrus’s voice trailed off and Kaidan knew it was only being said for his own benefit, but still found he appreciated the idea of it.

Kaidan, though, just shook his head, “It’s been almost a year and we’ve gone through all the rubble. If she was there, we would have found her. Besides, she wasn’t wearing her tags.”

As Kaidan looked down to his hands, he swore he could feel Garrus looking at him as the Turian asked, “ _What_? What do you mean by that?”

Kaidan looked up over to Garrus again, and sighed, as he pulled out the silver chain hanging around his neck, revealing the dog tags and took the chain off his neck. He held it out for Garrus to take. “Because she was wearing mine. I found out on my birthday, Liara was given a message from Shepard to give to me, and in it was a vid message, and these.”

Garrus turned the dog tags around between his hands and looked closely at them, and Kaidan could only assume he was feeling the same thing Kaidan had - he was holding the last thing that belonged to Shepard anymore, the last thing that was uniquely hers and no one elses. “Shit.” It was all that Garrus managed to say, and it took him a bit before he handed the dog tags back to Kaidan.

“Yeah.” Kaidan nodded, as he put the dog tags back on and put them back securely under his shirt as the elevator doors opened.

Garrus and Kaidan both looked up to see Joker and Tali walk out, and Joker looked defeated.

“Well?” Kaidan asked, trying to sound hopeful for Joker, “What did you find?”

Tali crossed her arms over her chest, “We found her backups, but they were really corrupted. I was only able to access one backup point, but it was--”

“--before the Suicide Mission.” Joker interrupted, taking off his hat and running a hand through his hair, “The last backup we could find was right before we went through the Omega-4 relay, and even that is still corrupted. There’s,” Joker paused before he threw his hat to the ground, “There’s fucking _nothing_ we can use.”

The hat fell at Kaidan’s feet, and he bent down to pick it up, holding it out for Joker, “There’s really nothing we can do? We can’t just reprogram her?”

Joker took his hat back from Kaidan roughly, wincing slightly at the pain the quick motion caused, “It’s before I unshackled her, it’s before she wiped herself of all ties to Cerberus.”

“The EDI we knew…” Tali started, but let her voice trail off, “Keelah, I’m sorry Joker.” She placed a gloved hand on his shoulder, but he brushed it off.

“Yeah. I need to get off this ship.” Joker muttered, walking past the three of them and towards the helm, to get off the ship. Garrus moved to follow Joker, but Kaidan stopped him, and stood up.

“I got it. I’ll see you guys later.” Kaidan said, nodding towards Garrus and Tali, and headed out after Joker. Garrus and Tali looked at each other in silence before Garrus wrapped his arm around her shoulder and left the Normandy with her.

************************

It had been a few hours since they had arrived back from the Normandy and headed back to Kaidan’s apartment. There hadn’t been a word spoken between the two men other than a muttered thanks for another beer, or anything else. They had sat in silence, watching the bioticball game, drinking.

Kaidan understood what Joker was going through. He was still going through it. So he didn’t mind sitting in silence, drinking, watching the game.

“So that’s it then.”

Joker’s voice broke the silence and Kaidan looked over to him. “What?”

“So that’s it then,” Joker repeated.

Kaidan raised his eyebrow, looking over to Joker with a raised eyebrow. "What's that supposed to mean?" He wasn't sure if it was because he had a lot to drink, and that things were starting to get hazy, mixed in with the strange emotional tension of the day, but Kaidan wasn't sure if he wanted to hear Joker's answer.

"I have to move on. Give up." Joker shrugged, his words slurring only slightly, his body slouched into the couch more. "I...I don't know, I wanted to believe that there was more to it, maybe there was a chance to bring her back. Right?" Joker shrugged, and looking over to Kaidan, "But I think after a while, I should have just realized that you can't raise the dead. Even if the dead was originally a AI, but you know. Details."

Kaidan stayed silent for a moment, nodding, "Yeah, but you can move on knowing that you tried. You have closure and all that, and I think she would have wanted you to be happy."

Joker cleared his throat, "I'm thinking you might be talking about both of us here, buddy."

"What?"

"Oh come on, Kaidan. The similarities can't be lost on you here. Minus the fact that EDI was in a sexy robot body, we're kinda going through the same thing. Yet, you're saying I can move on and you're not letting yourself."

Kaidan sighed, "If this was some awkward attempt at reverse psychology..."

"Do you seriously think I am capable of that? Dammit, Kaidan, I'm a pilot, not a doctor!"

Kaidan just looked at Joker with a blank stare. Joker just groaned in frustration.

"You know what, nevermind, all my jokes are lost on you. Completely wasted." Joker stayed silent for a moment, shaking his head before he started again. "Listen. I'm not saying that I'm just going to get over things immediately, but maybe I need to make more of an effort to move on. Maybe we _both_ do. Honestly, Kaidan, do you really think the Commander would want you miserable and alone the rest of your life? At least make the effort to try before you end up alone anyway, I mean you're a pretty awkward guy sometimes."

A light chuckle left Kaidan, as he sighed, "No, I know she would want me to move on. She told me so."

Joker just nodded, not asking for elaboration as to when exactly Kaidan got that information, and Kaidan found he was thankful for it. Kaidan had to admit he had been having these types of conversations way too often lately, and it was starting to get to him. He got it. He had to move on, he had to continue on with his life, but dammit it wasn't that easy. He hated people thinking it was.

Yet, here was Joker, dealing with the same type of thing, and he was all but accepting that it was time to get on with his life. Kaidan found he was surprised, wishing he could be like Joker in this moment, if only to feel like he had the strength. He never thought he'd say that Joker was stronger than him, but in a lot of ways the pilot always was. At least, emotionally, if not physically.

"I should get going." Joker eventually said, moving to stand up, wobbling a little due to the drinking, and readjusted his cap. It wasn't far to call a cab, so Kaidan wasn't worried about him. "If I have to be in the 'time to move on' club, at least I got another member, huh?" Joker held out his hand and Kaidan nodded, shaking it in agreement.

"Yeah. Could be worse."

"Damn straight, it could be. Now, I can't take anymore of this emotion bullshit, I need to go gain some masculinity back now...by going home and passing out." Joker laughed, half-nodding, his smile not completely taking over his face. Yeah, he was still affected by everything, but it was obvious he was going to try to make the best of it. That was something Kaidan couldn't say he had tried to do yet.

The two men said goodbye, planned for a poker night soon, and eventually Kaidan was left alone. Instead of going to bed though, he got another beer and sat back down on the couch, deciding to watch vids for the rest of the night. It was far better than staying awake with nothing but the voices in his head.

Tomorrow, he'd start a real effort. Tomorrow, he'd start to try to make Shepard proud, and to do what she asked of him.

Even though he had said it to himself many times before, this time he meant it.

Tomorrow, he would start over.


	10. Day 352

"Got the flush!"

"God dammit, Elvis!"

"Seriously?!"

"By the goddess..."

"Liara, _why_ do you always say that?"

"Why do _you_ always say you're 'calibrating'?"

" _Keelah_ , both of you!"

Laughter was erupting around the poker table, as Kaidan happily took his winnings, watching his credit account grow larger as Samantha transferred the night's pot into his account. Sometimes, Kaidan wished they played poker the old fashioned way, rather than using a GUI system on the table, it would have been nice to hold all those chips in his hand. But then again, getting the money transferred was easier. Still, the laughter around the room was infectious, and Kaidan was glad to have it. It had been a long time since he had this good of a night, but these were starting to become frequent. The longer he hung around the crew, the more he realized that not only were they friends, they were family.

Only, that didn't stop James from furrowing his brow at losing yet another poker match to Kaidan, and that didn't stop Garrus from getting frustrated that he just kept losing every time in general. Liara and Tali, well they were both there for the amusement factor, and Steve was there to make sure James didn't flip the table -- which had happened before, and that was a night that more medigel was used than should have been during a poker game. Joker was so close to beating Kaidan this time, but ended up distracted when he got a vid message on his omni-tool and had left the room. Samantha was happy to play the banker, because it gave her a sense of power. Plus, she sucked at poker, and no one wanted to play her in chess, which she was severly disappointed in.

"We can still play something else, you know! Something more..." Samantha started, and Tali just pointed at her and shook her head.

"No! No more of your games, you always play the innocent card, and I...always fall for it!"

Samantha laughed, "I can't help if you fall for my girlish charms!"

"Wait, you've fallen for them?" Garrus asked, teasing as he looked at Tali, "Is there a vid of this?"

Tali just scowled at Garrus, which made everyone else around the table laugh as well. It was good to have nights like this - even if it meant that Kaidan was being taken for all the food and drink that they had in the apartment. Deciding that maybe a refill of things might be needed, he stood up, "Anyone want anything?"

It seemed to be a bad question to ask, because everyone started to shout out random things, and Kaidan held out his hands in a placating gesture and laughed. "I'll just try to come back with one of...everything? Okay, hold on. I'll figure something out."

The conversation continued as he left the back room and headed into the kitchen, finding Joker there leaning against the counter, finishing up his vid feed. "Yeah, okay. Sounds good, I'll see you then." Joker closed the message and put away his omni-tool, just as Kaidan watched into the kitchen and gave Joker a look.

"Planning something?" Kaidan asked as he opened the fridge, starting to pull out as many different kinds of alcohol that he had in there, and set them on the kitchen island.

"You know me, I'm gonna take down the casino. I'll be rich!" Joker laughed, "Or I'll be broken in fourteen different places and end up in jail. You know, the usual."

"The usual?" Kaidan raised an eyebrow and looked over at Joker as he set another beer down on the counter, "Never took you for the criminal type."

Joker shrugged, "Maybe I'm changing."

"So are you gonna tell me what the vid was? Or am I going to have to have Samantha hack you?"

Joker pretended to wince and laughed, "Damn, Kaidan, using that Spectre authority to good use."

Kaidan took out a few more beers and closed the fridge with his foot, "If I was using Spectre authority, I wouldn't be asking Samantha to hack you." He grinned, which only caused Joker to laugh harder. "So?"

Joker shook his head in amusement, "Fine, if you have to know, I have...a date."

Kaidan was happy he had put the beer on the counter, because he might have dropped them all on the floor in surprise. "A...seriously? With who?"

"She's a fighter pilot with the Alliance. Or was. One of Steve's friends." Joker shrugged again, "Figured why not."

Kaidan handed Joker a beer, as he took a few in his hands and started for the poker room, "Well good for you."

Joker laughed and rolled his eyes, "Yeah. Thanks."

The two men walked back into the poker room, where Tali had gotten up on the table and was dancing, and everyone else was either chatting or dancing, or both. "Hey Tali, don't break the table!" Kaidan called out, as he handed out beers. He tossed Garrus a dextro one, and Garrus caught it, laughing.

"Don't give her ideas, Kaidan. She's been destructive lately."

Tali stopped dancing and jumped off the table, and smacked Garrus in the chest. " _Shut up_!" She hissed at him, and Garrus laughed harder, and Kaidan decided he didn't really want to know.

“Major, come dance with me!” Liara called over, holding out her hands, and she didn’t really wait for an answer as she grabbed Kaidan anyway and pulled him over to dance with her and Samantha, while Steve and James took the whole scene in.

“I’m not really a dancer, Liara!” Kaidan laughed, handing off the last drinks he had in his hands to James and Steve before being pulled back in by Samantha.

James laughed, “I know, you dance a lot like Esteban!” This caused Steve to scowl and punch James in the bicep, but Steve then immediately shook his hand out after, wincing a bit.

“Jesus, Mr. Vega, are you make of steel?”

Even though Kaidan’s back was to James, he rolled his eyes already knowing the comment that would come. “You know it, buns of steel too!” _There it was_.

The more they danced, and hung out, the more drinks were being brought into the room, and sooner rather than later, Kaidan could feel that he was getting a bit of a buzz. Actually, perhaps far more than that, as he looked around the room to see that the dancing had slowed down -- and at some point they had all moved into the living room. Why didn’t he remember that?

Though, that didn’t bother him, not realizing he had moved into another room. It also didn’t bother him that he was more drunk than sober. Actually, nothing was bothering him right now. Not a single thing. Nothing was tugging at him, there was no overwhelming feeling to act or react to something, all that was...was nothing. For the first time in a while, the biggest priority Kaidan had was to just _be_.

He almost couldn’t remember the last time he hung out like this, relaxed like this. In that moment, everything felt like it was going to be okay. Like he could really get on with his life, that he could really move on.

At some point of being lost in thought, someone had turned on the vid screen and the news popped up, talking about how they were close to the anniversary of the war ending. _”And with the end of the war, the one year anniversary coming up, we remember all that were lost in the process. Of course, we also remember and thank Admiral David Anderson and Commander Jennifer Shepard, both who gave their lives to ensure that the rest of us kept ours. There will be a memorial service as well as a celebration of our now bright future thanks to these two great heroes in less than two weeks. Stay tuned to ANN, as we give you up to the minute details on all of the events."_

The room was silent then, and while Kaidan was looking at the screen, for a brief moment he felt a few pairs of eyes looking at him. Joker was the one to break the silence, “Are you okay?” He asked, and Kaidan blinked, realizing they were talking to him.

“Ah,” Kaidan started, and paused. Was he okay? Less than two weeks away, and he hadn’t known. It honestly hadn’t even crossed his mind. So, was he okay? “You know, yeah. Yeah, I am.” He said, small confidence in his voice, “We’re all okay,” he added, and smiled.

Steve nodded and looked like he was going to say something, but then Garrus interrupted. “Okay, so we can...get more drinks now, right? Because I say we keep going, when was the last time we all did this?”

Tali groaned, though Kaidan couldn’t tell if it was out of annoyance or not, and James laughed. “Scars has it right! Let’s celebrate and make a toast!” James got up and went over to the bar in the living room and set out enough alcohol for everyone, making everyone the strongest drink that he could. He passed them out around the room, and when everyone had a glass, James raised his. “To Shepard!”

They all cheered in unison, “To Shepard!” Each drink was downed (or in Tali’s case, sipped through the straw carefully) and then Kaidan changed the topic.

“Hey, Joker has a date tomorrow. Someone teach him how to dance.” Kaidan said, trying to sound as if he was only trying to help, but he could feel Joker’s eyes burning into the back of his skull. Good to have the focus on someone else for a change.

“ _Excuse me_?” Joker gaped, but it was too late. Samantha and Liara were already going towards him laughing, as Tali turned the music up, and Kaidan could almost make out Joker cursing his name.


	11. Day 365

When Kaidan Alenko woke up, it was to the sound of Commander Jennifer Shepard’s voice.

It was in the distance, but it was there, clear as day, and he knew he wasn’t dreaming. His heart was beating fast. His skin flushed warm, his biotics started to run hot. It was Shepard’s voice.

He shot up out of bed, and got dressed quickly, running down the stairs to find Samantha had the same reaction, and following her was Nasra. While both women waited for Kaidan to get to the bottom of the stairs, he ran past them and out the apartment door, barely getting his Spectre hoodie on before he ran full speed towards the stairs of the building.

The faster he ran, the louder Shepard’s voice had gotten, and by the time he reached the end of the stairs, his heart was in his throat. He ran towards the direction of her voice, not sure what he was looking for. It wasn’t until he got to the Presidium -- since when was it this close to the Strip? -- he saw her.

There she stood, proud and alive, and Kaidan’s running slowed to a walk. He was in disbelief. Yet, there she was. Standing in front of him, and her hand reached out, as if it was for him to take.

“Kaidan,” Jennifer said, her voice as full and beautiful as ever, and as Kaidan got closer to her, her grin got wider. “Kaidan,” she repeated as he walked up to the steps leading to the platform she was on.

He reached for her hand, and she smiled still. “Kaidan,” She said again, and he replied, “Jennifer.”

“Kaidan, you need to wake up.”

“What?” He reached out for her hand and their fingers touched but soon she turned into sand and disappeared between his fingertips, and soon he was back on the battlefield, his armor covered in blood. He was limping, his arm around James as he saw the Normandy waiting in front of them.

_No._

No, he wasn’t going to do this. He wasn’t going to leave Shepard alone. Not this time. “Jennifer, no!”

“I love you,” She said proudly, though there was fear in his eyes, and Kaidan fought against James’ suddenly strong hold on him.

“Jennifer, no! You’ll die!”

“Kaidan, you need to wake up.”

“No! This is all I have.”

“Kaidan, wake up.”

“No!”

“Kaidan--”

“Wake up!” Samantha’s voice was worried as she placed a hand on Kaidan’s bare shoulder and he shot up quickly in bed, his heart racing. He rubbed his eyes a few times, and looked at Samantha and he couldn’t hide the sorrow on his face. Though this very quickly faded, or at least was hidden as he lowered his head and ran a hand through his hair, his fingers eventually running down and resting on his L2 implant.

"What time is it?" Kaidan asked, groggy and trying to figure out where he was exactly, slowly piecing everything together. What he experienced was a dream. The same dream he had been having a lot lately, though tonight he got closer to Shepard than he ever had before. He had touched her this time, and it felt so real, it was almost as if he could still feel her fingers as a ghost touch against his own.

"It's almost noon, and the ceremony is in two hours. I was going to let you rest a little longer, but you started screaming..." Samantha sat at the edge of the bed, and Kaidan looked up at her, seeing that his roommate had a small hint of fear behind her eyes. "Are you alright?"

Clearing his throat, he looked at Samantha, confused. "I was screaming? There wasn't anything in my dream that would have warranted that..." He lied.

Samantha just shrugged, "Well was it the same dream you've had before?"

Kaidan just nodded.

"Maybe something new happened this time?"

"No, I just...got closer this time."

Samantha shrugged again. "Well, in any case, Nasra is down stairs making us lunch, you're more than welcome to join us if you'd like!" She offered a smile and Kaidan nodded. Nasra had been spending more and more time at the apartment with Samantha lately, despite having her own place. But Kaidan was starting to wonder if the two women stayed around simply for his own benefit and not for their own.

That would suck, being the main reason to stick around for. He felt like a charity case.

"Yeah, sure. Let me get dressed, I'll see you both down there." Kaidan offered a small smile, and Samantha seemed satisfied with it enough that she left the room to give Kaidan privacy.

It took a moment before he got out of bed, and turned all of the lights on in the room, and the moment he did, he winced audibly and covered his eyes. He didn't think the lights were all that bright before. Actually, he didn't think he had this many lights in here. Did someone add them in?

Stumbling a bit as he walked, he finally got into the bathroom, where the light was a little harsher and he lowered his hand from his forehead, no longer shielding his eyes, as he looked into the mirror. Perhaps he should have kept his eyes shielded.

What he saw in the mirror wasn't the man he knew he was. Instead, the Kaidan Alenko in the mirror was a broken man. A bushy beard had now taken up residence on his face, his eyes had large dark circles under them, and he looked worn out. It had only been a few weeks since he had sworn that he was going to make his life better, to just get up and get on with his life, but with the way that things had been going...well that wasn't going to happen.

Things had gone downhill fast. With the anniversary of the war coming up, the past two weeks had been nothing but interviews, documentaries, stories of Shepard and her crew. Being a part of the crew meant that there were eventually going to be documentaries on him, and those were the ones he ended up catching by accident. The story of Shepard and the Normandy SR-1. Hell, there was a full on documentary about Virmire, and what happened. Who was left behind, who survived.

Kaidan had always had a bit of survivor guilt when it came to Virmire, and having a documentary pretty much repeat that for the galaxy to see? It cut way too deep.

Normally, he could walk around the Citadel without being noticed by too many people, but with everyone watching anything that had to do with the Reaper War, the media going above and beyond to remind everyone that a year ago they all almost died, well it meant things changed. Now Kaidan was getting noticed and stopped on the street -- along with everyone else from the crew -- and the interview requests were becoming more and more frequent.

More in-depth stories came out on the extranet too about the crew, not just about Shepard: _Archangel: The True Story_ , _Becoming a Spectre: An In-depth Look at the Second Human Spectre_ , _The N7 Story_ , _The End of the Genophage; How Clan Urdnot Helped Change History_. Reports were everywhere, and it wasn't something that anyone could hide from.

The stories that Kaidan hated the most though, were about his personal relationship with Jennifer Shepard. The tabloid stories about how she might have cheated on him while she was with Cerberus, stories about how Kaidan apparently couldn't handle Shepard and had to leave, anything the tabloids could come up with that would make a juicy story. Even Diana Allers had written one, though it was more of a personal observation on Kaidan and Shepard. Needless to say, Kaidan lost a little more respect for Allers once it was published.

Moving on wasn't going to work. He needed a serious distraction, and that ended up coming in the form of Jack, Joker, and James. They had all started to go to the casino, or the arena (Joker watching and making fun of them while the other three fought), and every night usually ended with a lot of drinking. It was starting to take its toll, and it told Kaidan he wasn't as strong as he thought he was emotionally.

The man in the mirror wasn't one Kaidan wanted to see anymore, but he wasn't sure he could help it.

A shower could help though.

***************

People were cheering, chanting _Shepard! Shepard!_ even though she wasn't there.

Instead, a steel statue stood of Shepard, standing proudly, holding up a Black Widow sniper rifle on her hip, her other hand saluting an unknown thing. It was a strange statue, because Kaidan couldn't remember a time where Shepard _ever_ stood like that. In fact, she wasn't as graceful as people were saying she was.

Hell, she tripped down the stairs in Feros in the ExoGeni headquarters, and ended up bursting into laughter as Kaidan and Wrex ran to help her up.

That was one of many moments, but Kaidan understood the reason not to portray the real side of Shepard. People needed to remember the soldier that won the war, the woman who got everyone in the galaxy to work together, not the klutz who couldn't dance (and when she did, she always need up dancing into a wall some how).

"Weird." Garrus' voice was hushed next to Kaidan, and Kaidan was relieved that he wasn't the only person finding the whole thing a little odd. "Who do you think she's saluting here?"

Kaidan crossed his arms over his chest and looked up at the statue, "Only people she would ever salute were Hackett and Anderson, and even Anderson told her to cut the crap after a while."

Garrus laughed, "I saluted her once, as a joke, and she almost twisted my arm off."

A chuckle escaped the two men and Kaidan was glad that at least he had people nearby that he could relate to right now. Actually, everyone near him he could relate to. Every member of the Normandy, no matter it was SR-1 or SR-2, were standing on the stage to the left of the statue, while Hackett gave a speech at the podium in front of the statue. Kaidan hadn't been listening to Hackett, but now that he was, it seemed to be something about how they all had to continue to work together, to make sure that Shepard's achievements were not in vain, that they could live up to her standards.

Her standards? _"Kaidan, all my clothes are dirty, so I'm stealing yours. Also, go get me a candy bar." "A candy bar, Shepard?" "Well yeah! I had some in my pockets but they melted...by the way, by my pockets I mean yours, you might need to get a new hoodie." "Uh. Seriously?" "Sorry!" "I don't even want to know how they melted." "Yeah, it has something to do with Wrex, and Garrus, and..." "I don't want to know!"_ Kaidan's lips curled into a small smirk, his eyes casted downward for a moment before he cleared his throat and composed himself again.

It was weird to hear Hackett talk about Shepard as if she was a perfect human being. She wasn't. She was flawed, she was imperfect, she let things get to her but she tried her hardest not to let it show. She carried the galaxy on her shoulders, and refused to share the weight, and that stress was with her until her death. Her death. The reason she was being martyred now.

It all left a sour taste in Kaidan's mouth.

An hour or so later, people started to head their own separate ways. The council thanked the Normandy crew for all that they did, and the Asari counsellor spoke with Kaidan briefly, thanking him for various things, bringing up the coup from a year ago as a main factor as to why she was glad he was on their side. It felt a bit strange, as if the counselor was trying to find a substitute for Shepard within Kaidan, but he took it gracefully. Or as gracefully as he could.

Truth be told, the day had been emotionally exhausting and he was ready for it to be over.

Only, it wouldn't be any time soon.

It was only a few moments after the Asari councilor went her own way, that Hackett came over to speak with Kaidan, with James and Liara in tow. "Major, a moment, please?" Hackett gestured for Kaidan to follow him into a private room, and James and Liara followed.

***************

"Major, I have something to ask of you, and I hope that I do not need to take no as an answer," Hackett stood in front of Kaidan, James, and Liara with his arms crossed over his chest. They had ended up in the human embassy, in Admiral Hackett's new office - what once was Counselor Udina's office.

"Uh, alright?" Kaidan said, apprehensively, as he took a seat in front of Hackett's desk. James took the seat next to him, and Liara stood near Hackett's side.

"I have recently accepted the position of Counsellor on behalf of humanity, and I need people that I can trust on my side. Your status as Spectre has give you a certain notoriety, and it is because of this that I want you to be part of my personal guard."

"Excuse me, sir?" Kaidan raised an eyebrow, trying his best not to show his confusion, but it was hard, especially with James making a confused grunt right next to him. "I'm not sure I know what you mean."

"You will remain a Spectre of course, working on behalf of the council and doing what you need to, but we need a stronger force here on the Citadel than before. Stronger than C-Sec, for when things call for a harsher punishment. It has been decided that each counselor will have one Spectre working for them, and one officer as their personal bodyguard. Lieutenant Vega, I would like to request that you be my personal bodyguard."

James and Kaidan looked at each other before looking back at Hackett, the two men silenced and stunned. The Admiral continued, "Please understand that I am not taking you away from your previous positions or posts that you may be assigned to, not if you don't want me to. We have all been in discussion for a long time about how to make the Citadel safer, about how we can prevent anything like a full out galactic war from happening again. We cannot do that without help."

"So we'll be working more as a team, than individually?" Kaidan asked, and Hackett nodded.

"Sir," James interjected, "When would this begin?"

"Immediately, if you wish to accept."

There was a beat before Kaidan spoke, "And Liara, why is she present for this? If I can ask, Sir."

Hackett looked over to Liara on his right, and she smiled at him. He nodded. "This was a plan put together by Dr. T'Soni and myself. A plan that had also been worked on by Shepard."

"Yes, when the three of us spoke about this, the Commander had recommended that both of you be the first assigned to this, to help us sort out everything. She felt that if anyone could make this plan run smoothly, it would be you two." Liara spoke softly, her hands held behind her back.

Kaidan swallowed hard. _That's now the second thing Shepard has asked of me._ "I..." He started, but James jumped in.

"I'm in!" James cleared his throat, immediately regretting his break in protocol and cleared his throat, "I mean, I would like to accept, Sir."

Hackett laughed deeply, and shook his head, amused. "At ease, Lieutenant. If you would like to join us, then I am happy to accept you."

James' shoulders relaxed and a grin broke out. "Alright! Hey, if Commander Shepard recommended me, how can I say no, right?" He looked over to Kaidan, "What about you, Major?"

Kaidan on the other hand, was not so quick to answer. He cleared his throat, "With all due respect, Admiral, but I am going to need to think on this."

Liara seemed to be surprised by Kaidan's reaction, but Hackett seemed to understand. "Of course, Major. I will need an answer by the end of the week, but I understand the need to weigh all the pros and cons."

While he hadn't expected Hackett to be so understanding, Kaidan found himself thankful. He moved to stand up, waiting for Hackett to acknowledge that it was okay, and did so when Hackett nodded. "Thank you, Sir. I promise to respond before the end of the week." He approached the desk and held out his hand, and Hackett shook Kaidan's hand with a strong grip.

"Thank you, Major. Lieutenant, I will have our ambassador send over the required paperwork to you immediately. You are both free to go." Hackett shook James' hand as well, and turned to Liara, "Dr. T'Soni, if you could stay here, I have some things to speak to you about."

"Of course. Kaidan, James. It was nice to see you both." Liara said, as the two Alliance men walked out of Hackett's office.

James waited all of two minutes after the door closed before exclaiming to Kaidan, "Are you crazy? How can you say no to Hackett? To Shepard's recommendation?"

Kaidan's eyes narrowed, "I am not saying no, but I'm not saying yes. It's a lot to think about, I can't just jump into this!"

The men headed towards the elevators, walking in step. "Why the hell not?" James asked, "I sure did!"

"I'm not you, James. It's...too much right now."

James started to say something then stopped though, instead furrowing his brow. "Yeah, I get it. Doesn't mean you shouldn't do it though."

"Can we drop it, please?" Kaidan all but snapped back, and sighed heavily. "I need a drink, I need to get...away from all of this right now."

"Yeah. Yeah, okay. I got it." James said, nodding, letting Kaidan do his own thing as the two of them headed into the elevator.

***************

As much as he wanted the day to be over, it wasn’t. Between Hackett’s offer of a slightly new job, and the full significance of what the day was, well Kaidan wasn’t exactly handling it well.

To be completely honest, he wasn‘t handling it at all.

He had every intention of heading back to his apartment, possibly to head back to sleep and let the entire day disappear, but it seemed like others had different plans. When he walked in, he was greeted to a small gathering of people: James, Steve, Samantha (sans Nasra), Garrus, Tali, and Joker. They were drinking and telling stories, but they weren’t really engaged in them.

Kaidan could have sworn that he could see the damn sadness and tension in the air, and wished he had managed to sneak back out and head to a hotel before he got caught trying to leave. Instead, he got pulled into what seemed like an argument of sorts.

While people were scattered around the apartment, Garrus and Tali seemed to be having a heated conversation. “Are you serious? Keelah, you tell me you’re leaving _now_?” Tali was saying, the tone of her voice more annoyed than angry, though Kaidan had a feeling it wasn’t going to last long.

“Tali…” Garrus started, and looked over to Kaidan for help, causing Kaidan only to shrug since he had no idea what was going on.

“Don’t you ‘Tali’ me! You said you would come with me to Rannoch and help, you promised me!”

“I got a job, I have to do this, Tali. I’m sorry.”

“A job you won’t even tell me about!” Tali looked over to Kaidan, “Can you _please_ talk some sense into him? Because this bosh’tet won’t listen to me anymore.” She had thrown her hands up in frustration and headed into the other room. Garrus just looked confused, as he sat down on a nearby chair.

Kaidan shrugged as he looked to Garrus, “Uh, what exactly did I get roped into?”

Garrus shook his head and looked downwards at the rug on the floor. “I’m heading out on a mission. I don’t know when I’ll be back, and I was supposed to head to Rannoch with Tali tomorrow.”

“What changed your mind?” Kaidan asked, crossing his arms over his chest, “I mean, I guess I can see where Tali is upset but...I mean…”

Garrus sighed, “Listen, it’s not something I can talk about. Right now, anyway. You out of all people should understand that, Major.”

As much as he didn’t want to, Kaidan did understand. He nodded. “Yeah, just...don’t keep Tali out of the loop on these things. You guys won’t work out otherwise.” He paused, “But whatever this mission is, you need to be careful.”

Garrus shifted in his seat before he stood up, “Yeah, I should--”

“Talk to Tali instead of just leaving? Yeah, Garrus, you should.” Kaidan said with a slight terse tone to him, almost surprised that Garrus would think of leaving to go on whatever mission he had without saying goodbye to someone he loved.

Granted, Kaidan knew that saying goodbye was the hardest part, and was never really worth it in the end -- goodbyes always seemed to be far too fatal these days. Or perhaps that was just Kaidan being bitter.

Garrus hadn’t said anything to Kaidan in response, instead he had nodded and walked over to where Tali was, and the two of them left the apartment, giving Kaidan a moment to breathe. Or a moment to escape up to his bedroom and call it a night, which was really all that he wanted to do. All he wanted was peace and quiet. All he wanted was to just be left alone.

Of course, as he tried his best to make it up the stairs without anyone noticing - god, he wished he had a cloak - he was stopped again by Samantha, asking Kaidan to have a few drinks with her. She called his name and he tried to ignore her. She called his name again, and he finally gave up, and walked down the two steps that he had managed to walk up and headed over to the living room bar.

The television played the news of the day, which was nothing but war stories, memorials, remembering those that they lost, remembering Shepard, all the things that Kaidan could not physically and mentally handle anymore. Samantha was saying something to him, but Kaidan couldn’t hear her, he was focused on the news.

_”Commander Shepard gave her life so that we could all live…_

_”..we still have a lot to rebuild, but we will survive…”_

_”Second Human Spectre Kaidan Alenko looked understandably grim today…”_

_”....so did we really deserve Commander Shepard to sacrifice herself?”_

_”It is on this day, exactly one year later, that we remember.”_

Kaidan stared at the vid feed, and still didn’t answer Samantha, as she kept asking him a question and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Kaidan? I’ve been asking you a quest--”

“ _Enough already!_ ” Kaidan snapped, stepping away from Samantha, causing those who were left in the room to stare at him with wide eyes. “Why can’t any of you just fucking leave me alone? All that I have dealt with this week is other people’s problems,” He glanced at Joker, “giving relationship advice when I’m really not in the place to do so,” he glanced at James and Steve, “and anything else that people want and demand of me but not a single person has asked me what _I_ want. No one has bothered to ask how I was doing one year after losing _the woman I loved_. I’ve had enough of everyone pulling me thousands of directions today, and I’m done.” Kaidan stared at Samantha, “I don’t care about your question, Samantha. I cannot take anything else right now. I am done.”

Samantha’s eyes fell to the ground, as Nasra hovered behind her protectively. “She was just going to ask you if it was alright if I moved in with you two.” Nasra snapped back, “But not until after you told us if you were okay, Kaidan.” Her eyes narrowed towards Kaidan, and despite being angry before, Kaidan just felt embarrassed.

“I...oh.” He cleared his throat, noticing that either everyone else was giving him narrowed eyes or looks of confusion. “Yeah, no that’s...fine. I...it’s been a really bad day and I just want to be alone right now.”

“Yeah,” Joker snapped, “We got that.” Joker stood up from his barstool and headed towards the apartment door, “And for the record, my _problem_? It was the same as yours, but at least I’m moving on, you just look like shit, and you’re acting it too. Get over yourself, Alenko.” Joker’s voice had venom in it that cut Kaidan to his core, and he watched as everyone else started to leave.

“Guys, I’m sorry, wait…” Kaidan started to protest but got nothing in return other than a scoff from Nasra. When everyone else left, only Samantha remained. “Sam, I’m sorry I snapped at you, I…”

Samantha nodded, “It’s okay. Really. I understand. But I think you’re right, you need some time to yourself. I’ll...come back in the morning, if that’s alright?”

Kaidan just nodded.

By the time Samantha left, Kaidan had grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the bar and sat down on the couch, staring at the news vids that kept playing. He drank straight from the bottle. He watched the news and lived it all over again. Eventually, when the news got to be too much, he finished off the bottle he had and grabbed another one, somehow managing to stumble upstairs into his bedroom. Collapsed on his bed later that night, he decided to re-watch the vids that Jennifer had left for him.

_This vid is my only will, and I have only one request. Kaidan, if you recieve this video, this means that I am no longer around. But that doesn’t mean I can’t still boss you around, and as your Commander, I have one final request. My request...is that you move on._

No more flip flopping. Kaidan couldn’t tell himself that he could turn over a new leaf when everything in his heart still hurt as badly as it did a year ago. Jennifer wanted Kaidan to move on, to get on with his life, but now it was painfully clear that he couldn’t.

So Kaidan Alenko, Second Human Spectre, finally admitted defeat and accepted that he preferred to live in the past.

The vid played on in the background as he finally fell into a drunken sleep.

_I want you to live, and love, and laugh, and get angry, and...be you. I want you to...be happy._


	12. Day 371

It was a start of another year without Jennifer Shepard. Despite everything that Kaidan had tried in the past to get himself to move on, he had finally accepted defeat: he couldn’t move on, he couldn’t do what Shepard asked of him, the last thing she had asked of him.

Well, minus asking that he join Hackett for some new position. Technically, that had been before she made the final video to him, before they landed on Earth. Kaidan still had not given Hackett his answer yet and the end of the week was fast approaching.

To be honest, he had been far too drunk to talk to Hackett, or anyone else for that matter. But he couldn't hold off from answering Hackett any longer. It wasn’t professional. It wasn’t right, and if he wanted to keep the respect of the newest human Councillor, he had to respond.

Still groggy from his sleep and hangover settling in, Kaidan sat up in bed and activated his omni tool, bringing up his messages. He idly flipped through them before he finally opened up a blank message and sent one off.

_TO: Admiral Steven Hackett_   
_FROM: Major Kaidan Alenko_   
_SUBJECT: Your Offer_   
_Admiral,_

_I would be honored to take you up on your offer, but I am going to need more time before I report to my new post. If this is not acceptable, and you need to rescind your offer, I understand. There are a few things I need to take care of first._

_\- Kaidan_

The message sent and Kaidan closed his eyes for a moment, resting his head back against the headboard. He wasn’t even sure what he said when he needed to take care of things, he wasn’t even sure what there was to take care _of_. It wasn’t as if his life was in that big of a disaster, it was that he was still too careless to get himself back into action and back into what he needed to do.

He was well aware he was taking this whole thing way too hard. It wasn’t even fully about Jennifer and the war anymore. It was about losing a lot of who he was in the past year, going through the motions and hoping something would jolt him back into life. It was about missing something he couldn’t get back, and trying to replace the empty hole with nothing that actually fit it all the way.

Was it unprofessional to request for more time, but still accept the job? Yes. Absolutely it was, but it wasn’t as if he would lose his Spectre status (or the cases he would get). Or at least, he hoped. Before the guilt of what he said in his email started to set in, a beep sounded from his omni tool.

_TO: Major Kaidan Alenko_   
_FROM: Admiral Steven Hackett_   
_SUBJECT: re: Your Offer_   
_Major Alenko,_

_I’m glad you took me up on my offer. I understand the need to wrap things up. Good luck, and let me know when you are ready. The position will be waiting for you._

_\- Hackett._

Kaidan sighed softly and closed out the message, not bothering to reply because he knew he didn’t need to. It gave him a little bit of a relief to know that he had a little more time to force himself into a better shape. He could keep going to the arena, hell he could try to get back down to Earth for a bit to work out there. He missed running sometimes, the gravel beneath his feet., wind blowing through his hair.

Sure, living on the citadel was nice, and now that Samantha and Kaidan had made up after he snapped at her, and Nasra didn’t want to rip his head off, it was nice to have a roommate. But sometimes, he wished he had more things to himself. Hell, he wished he had more alone time in general, sometimes being around people was much too much to deal with.

Getting away could be good. Hell, it could be fantastic. It sounded more like maybe he needed a vacation more than anything else. It could be nice, to get away from everything, to finally clear his head once and for all. Maybe that could work. Maybe it could--

His thoughts were interrupted by another message beep from his omni tool. According to the time stamp on the email, it had been sitting there for about ten minutes, and was coming from an unidentified sender. Hesitating for a moment, Kaidan finally gave in and read it, and promptly replied. An answer came shortly after, and they bounced back and forth for a minute or two.

_Kaidan. I need to meet with you._

Kaidan raised an eyebrow as he read it, and debated not replying for a while. After a few minutes he finally did.

_Who is this?_

_Miranda. We need to meet._

_Why?_

_I would much rather tell you in person. Will you meet with me, or should I focus my attention elsewhere?_

_I don't know what you want from me, Miranda._

_Yes or no._

_Fine. Yes. When?_

Much to Kaidan’s surprise, the last message took a while to get back to him. Finally when he received it, he raised an eyebrow.

_Today. Sushi. Dress nice._

A pseudo date would be strange, but he was pretty sure that wasn’t what Miranda wanted from him. Actually, he had no idea _what_ Miranda wanted from him, and he almost didn’t want to find out. But this could have been the excuse he needed to get away from things. What ever she wanted to do, seemed important. Miranda Lawson had never struck Kaidan as the type to contact someone unless she needed them for something.

Still hungover, he finally got out of bed and showered, getting dressed nicely as she requested. If anything, this would be an interesting and awkward story to tell Samantha later. He didn’t bother leaving a note, he’d be back in a few hours. He wasn’t expecting meeting Miranda to go for too long.

Of course, Kaidan was never really good with managing expectations.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As many of you already know, this story was a prequel to ["Finding Shepard"](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1036723/chapters/2067511), written by [masterthief](http://archiveofourown.org/users/masterthief/pseuds/masterthief) and myself. If you have not read it already, you can find it in the [series](http://archiveofourown.org/series/68671) attached to this story. There may be changes to "Finding Shepard" in the up coming days, but nothing major that would cause a re-read -- unless you really want to! (And I hope you do!) Thank you for reading!


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